Author . 



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SCH001> EFFICIENCY MONOGRAPHS 



339 



THE PUBLIC AND 
ITS SCHOOL 



MCANDREW 




Class 4/^^^3^L_ 

Bookj:BsiJ::ri3_ 

Copyright N°__ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSm 



THE PUBLIC AND ITS SCHOOL 



SCHOOL EFFICIENCY MONOGRAPHS 

THE PUBLIC AND 
ITS SCHOOL 

A STATEMENT OF THE MEANS OF FINDING 
WHAT THE INTELLIGENT PUBLIC EXPECTS 
OF CHILDREN AND HOW A SCHOOL SYSTEM 
MAY BE MANAGED TO DELIVER THE GOODS 

BY 

WILLIAM McANDREW 

ASSOCIATE SUPERINTENDENT, NEW YORK 
CITY SCHOOLS 

RELIEVED By PICTURES HADE BY 
SCHOOL GIRLS AND BOrS 




YONKERS- ON -HUDSON, NEW YORK 

WORLD BOOK COMPANY 

1916 






COPYRIGHT, I 9 I 6 
BY WORLD BOOK COMPANY 




THE -PLIMPTON -PRESS 
NORWOOD 'MASS* C'S- A 



|)CI.A4;n039 



AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

I AM surprised. World Booh Company, at your 
threat to make a piiblic book out of a home- 
made document designed for family use. Our 
official edition, like those zvho got it, is exhausted. 

Your plan to put ''go" into the thing by means 
of school children's pictures ought to mitigate its 
solemnity. Such cheerful effect is one of the bless- 
ings the Lord conferred when He gave us boys and 
girls. This may dispel some of the awful dignity 
that loivers over tvhat should be the merriest 
business of all : teaching school. 

You will offend some good and sober people. 
The credit will be yours. I need have nothing to 
do with any part of the venture. 

Wm. McAndrew 



EDITORL\L COMMENT 1 

T^HERE is only one William McAndrew and he is 

•*- something different every time he comes to the 
bat. We were of those who were not easily reconciled 
to his leaving the Washington Irving High School. It 
seemed as though he was the last man in the world to be 
harnessed to the inevitable treadmill work of a great city 
supervisory system. 

William McAndrew is a genius, first, last, and all the 
time. He thinks, acts, writes, speaks as a genius. He 
has criticised traditions mercilessly. When he lets him- 
self loose with his pen, no one knows what he is to hit or 
what fragments will remain after he has hit a tradition. 

What could such a man do with the responsibility of 
leadership in a district with 100,000 children, more or less! 

W'ell, what did he do? 

W'ith this query in mind we turned with keen interest 
and some anxiety to his first report upon the schools of 
Brooklyn, just published by the New York Board of 
Education. 

Imagine our delight at finding McAndrew, William 
McAndrew, fiercest of critics, corralling all critics of the 
schools in Brooklyn, taming them, harnessing them, and 
making them pull together like a trained team. 

"It takes a rogue to catch a rogue," and it evidently 
required a critic to tame and harness, for team work, the 
critics of Brooklyn. 

Nowhere else in professional or profane literature can 
there be found as valuable a summary of criticism and 
remedies as in this report. No Inquiry, Survey, or Inves- 

' From Journal of Education for September 30, 1916. 

Cvii] 



tigation has been as constructive as is this report of Mr. 
McAndrew. 

It should be published at once by the United States 
Bureau of Education as a monograph, or by World Book 
Company in its School Efficiency Series. It comes near 
having the ring of one of Horace Mann's reports of 
seventy years ago. . . . 

The conclusion of McAndrew's report is that all of the 
things employers expect of graduates are attainable with 
a surprisingly small amount of effort. The schools will 
not suffer by taking up the criticisms passed upon them. 
On the contrary they will benefit. Every school ought 
to invite a committee of taxpayers to formulate the 
definite abilities expected of the graduates and at desig- 
nated periods ought to be invited to test the graduates 
upon such abilities. McAndrew proposes this as a means 
of holding a close bond of friendship and loyalty between 
the pubUc and the schools. He contends that such defi- 
nite and intimate knowledge of what the schools are 
doing is essential for their adequate support. 

His report contains a complete summary of abilities 
proposed by Brooklyn citizens, employers, ministers, edi- 
tors, mothers, schoolmasters, as necessary in the Brooklyn 
youngster on graduation day. McAndrew applies general 
principles of management to the problem of directing the 
schools so as to turn out this product. He enumerates 
the agencies existent in Brooklyn for getting the result. 
A remarkable thing about the project is that it has been 
formulated by conference and cooperation and is not a 
theatrical conception proposed for imposition upon the 
schools. 

Get this report at once if you can. If you cannot get a 
copy, stir somebody up to print it so that it can be had 
by everyone who wishes it. 

A. E. WiNSHIP 

[viii] 



PUBLISHER'S STATEMENT 

AT its best today the school report is a prophecy 
and a convincing appeal, a program for next year, a 
road map with warnings and assurances. Yet the clammy 
hand of tradition and conventionality still writes too 
many reports, — and spoils them. Timidity or inatten- 
tion to technic or tardy planning interferes often, with 
the result that the reporter writes away from the audi- 
ences he sincerely aims to inform and win. 

Two kinds of help can be given to those who write 
school reports, whether superintendents, principals, super- 
visors, teachers, business agents, or trustees: 

1. Reports, as printed or in manuscript, can be submitted 

for frank review to experts in the education depart- 
ments of universities or in the United States Bureau of 
Education, or to such agencies as the Institute for 
Pul)lic Service, New York City. 

2. Helpful reports can be given wide circulation to stimu- 

late competition and emulation. 

The Public and its School is an effort of World Book 
Company to afford this kind of aid. The author, William 
jNIcAndrew, is widely known to teacher's associations as a 
man with a message and a humorous, forceful, courageous 
way of uttering that message. 

This hook is Mr. McAndrew's annual report as Division 
Superintendent in charge of the elementary schools in 
Brooklyn. While addressed to City Superintendent 
William H. ^laxwell, it contains in every .sentence a 
message not only for superintendents everywhere but 
for parents, taxpayers, employers, and teachers. In it 
readers will find: 

[ix] 



1. How to write to several audiences at one time. 

2. How to test teaching, pupils, and product. 

3. How to bring the schools back to the public, — how to 

recognize the proprietorship of the public and the 
partnership of trustees and teachers. 

4. How to win support by admitting past deficiencies and 

listing future needs. 

5. How to use excellences for correcting deficiencies. 

6. How to make every supervisor and teacher a surveyor 

of his own work. 

7. How to open the way for general truths by clear state- 

ments of concrete facts. 

8. How to combine dignity with humor and directness. 

9. How to inspire a desire for self-testing and self-advance- 

ment in teacher and community. 
10. How to stimulate originality and preference for results 
over guesses. 

For readers who are not familiar with the organization 
of the New York City school system, a word of explana- 
tion as to the position of a division superintendent may 
be in order. 

At the head of the entire school system is the City 
Superintendent, who is assisted by eight associate super- 
intendents. The elementary schools of the city are divided 
geographically into forty-six school districts, each of which 
has a district superintendent, who reports directly to the 
City Superintendent. These forty-six districts are grouped 
into six divisions, and the high schools and training schools 
make two additional divisions. The eight divisions are 
assigned among six of the associate superintendents. 

For the school year of 1914-15, Associate Superinten- 
dent McAndrew had charge of Divisions 4 and 5, which 
include all the Brooklyn districts. The report which 
follows is a summary of the cooperative study of the 
needs of the two divisions, undertaken by the Division 
Superintendent and groups of principals, teachers, and 
citizens. 

World Book Compant 

[x] 



CONTENTS 

PABAQBAPH 

What a Division Report Should Be 1 

New Features in Brooklyn — Vocational Gary 

System 4-7 

Criticism of School Rbbults — "Graduates cannot 

write, spell, or figure" 8-9 

Ability Tests by Employers 10-16 

Self-correction 17-19 

Value of the Department-store Test 20-22 

Influence of Examiner 23 

Guesses and Results 24 

\'ariations in Schools 25 

Getting the Knack and the Pleasure 26-28 

Interest and Drill 29 

Exhibitions of Ability 30-31 

Use of the Criticisms of the Year 32 

What a Brooklyn Graduate Should Be — Sugges- 
tions from various sources 33-36 

What a School and a Principal Are For — Analy- 
sis of human products. Working by plan 37-41 

The Science of Supervision — Underlying principles 42 
Ideals and Revisions — Professional facilities and 
work in Brooklyn. The Brooklyn Teachers' .\ssocia- 

tion. .\ publication needed. Saturday conference. . 43-51 
Efficiency Stand.4.rds — ■ Periodic inspections. Rating 

a principal. Judgment of results 52-56 

Efficiency Records 57-62 

IxsTANciis OF Efficient Org.4^niz.\tion — Care of 

Buildings. Fire drills. Saengerfest. Flag Day 63-71 

Principal's Inckeiased Responsibiuty 70-7 1 

Principals: Obedience and Originality 72-73 

Where a Principal Ought to Be 74-75 

Cxi] 



PARAQRAPH 

Reduction op Clerical Work 76-81 

Cheering the Principal — Depreciation of salary 

requires offset 82 

Efficiency Records of Graduates — Present records 
obsolete. Suggested substitutes. Guarantee of em- 
ployers 83-88 

Efficiency Records of Teachers — Lack of stand- 
ards. Too subjective. Rating system not used 
as intended. A teacher's work tested by pupils' 
attainment 89-93 

Efficiency Rewards — Relation between work and 
pay. Stagnation from automatic increase. Criti- 
cism by teachers' and principals' organizations. Ob- 
ligation for present salary schedules. Small number 
of non-meritorious ratings. Vulnerability of school 
system to attack. Encouragement of mediocrity. 
Definite proposals. Stiffening required 94-102 

Discipline of Staff — Large measures neglected for 
attention to petty personal grievances. Reasons 
why more businesslike management of complaints 
is needed. The fair deal. Waste in oral complaints. 
Anonymous letters 103-105 

Costs — Schoolmaster's isolation from financial poli- 
cies of the system. Cost of a school per minute. 
Waste at opening and close of terms 106 

Pronouncing the School System All Wrong — ■ 
Specific criticism not sweeping condemnation. Ex- 
actness of definition needed 107-109 

Summary of Recommendations 110-111 



[xii] 



THE PUBLIC AND ITS SCHOOL 




THE 

PUBLIC AND ITS SCHOOL 

Hl'RCHES, homes, and schools have been 
Brooklyn's boast for many years. Public in- 
terest in education is more alive than in any 
community I know of. All the Brooklyn news- 
papers pay unusual attention to schools. The 
public turns out for school exercises in large numbers. 
No apology ought to be necessary for the length of any 
report on the schools of the Brooklyn divisions. 

WHAT A DIVISION REPORT SHOULD BE 

1. Official expectation of what a division report should 
be, I find in Board of Education Document Number 
Sbc, lOVl, page 4: 

2. "A report by a division superintendent is obviously 
a record of specific information with reference to the 
pupils under the care of that part of the educational 
system assigned to him. Apparently the division heads 
are left to themselves and may report at random upon 
whatever has appealed to them without the direction of 
their attention definitely to certain essential functions 
common to all divisions." 

3. The following report is planned in accordance with 
the first part of the paragrapli just quoted and takes 
advantage of the freedom described in the last part. 

NEW FEATOTIES IN BROOKLYN 

4. During the school year 1914-15 two radical de- 
partures have been made in the Brooklyn divisions. 



5. Elementary Public Schools 5 and 158 were put 
upon new programs involving attention to vocational 
pursuits. Although the work of these schools is covered 
in detail in Associate Superintendent Ettinger's report, 
their influence upon the educational service of the 
borough requires reference to them here. The construc- 
tive exercises introduced into these schools, based upon 
a wide review of educational experiments in other cities, 
have thereby obtained an advantage which has freed the 
work of the year from much of the objection which not 
imcommonly impedes any departure from the usual 
educational track. But the increase in the number 
of self-expressive exercises not only has produced a pro- 
nounced enthusiasm in the boys and girls for this kind 
of work but has affected the old-line school subjects in a 
remarkable manner. The connection between book study 
and actual construction carried out in this new type of 
school has provided a new motive in class recitation which 
is evident. The visits of principals and teachers to these 
schools have created an active sentiment in the borough 
for more schools of this kind. Not only are the Brook- 
lyn newspapers pronounced in commending the departure, 
but principals and citizens are asking that new school 
buildings, when obtained, shall be equipped for the type 
of school represented in these organizations. 

6. The Brooklyn Trade School for Boys, organized 
this year, also is reported on by Associate Superintendent 
Ettinger. 

7. On November 6, 1914, Mr. William Wirt, Superin- 
tendent of Schools of Gary, Indiana, reorganized PubUc 
School 89 to secure for each child a six-hour day with 
opportunities of study, work, play, and coordination of 
child-welfare agencies. The relief afforded this congested 
school by the new program is very marked. Even with- 
out the special equipment, which is an essential part of the 

[2] 



/ 


^^ 1 

r nnn nn n nnp 

nnnn nn nniff 
(innn nn nnfn 
nnnn jp^ nn«n 




nnnn fm .mfW *^ >^ \ 
n nnn mi nnoi " \ V 
rinnQ mi nnnc \ \^ 



KNOCKING THE SCHOOLS 



Gary system, the advantage to the children in this school 
is so evident that the new plan has proved welt worth the 
change. In my visits to this school, / have been im- 
pressed with the spirit of principal and teachers, with the 
»mooth running of the machinery, and with the progress of 
the pupils. 



CRITICISM OF SCHOOL RESULTS 

8. "Specific information with reference to the pupils" 
of the divisions, as related to "the administration and 
supervision" of the schools, seems especially desirable 
this year on account of criticism of the education given 
and the cost of giving it. Newspapers circulated in the 
divisions and newspapers published in them gave promi- 
nence to charges that the children "are not thoroughly 
grounded in anything." "Reading, writing, and arith- 
metic are wofully neglected, though correct spelling, 
ability to figure, and legible writing are as essential today 
as ever before." "So many subjects have been crowded 
into the course of study that a thorough training in those 
few which are essential is impossible." "The defects 
are not confined to children who leave before they finish 
the course, but exist in those who have the grammar school 
certificates." "It is almost impossible now to get com- 
petent boys and girls, and the natural conclusion is that 
the pubhc schools are at fault." "The elementary school 

[3] 



graduates cannot spell, write, or figure because they are 
victims of special courses and psychological pedagogy." 
One editor predicted that the schools would take the 
criticisms with smiling patience and cheerful philosophy. 
"The teachers will grin at each other out of the tails of 
their eyes when a man comes along to tell them they are 
not teaching the three R's." One pubUc writer says, 
"These charges are heard on all sides"; another, "The 
schools have stood this a long time without attempting to 
refute it." An unusual amount of general criticism of 
the schools as extravagant consumers of taxes and able 
to do better public service than at present followed the 
specific complaints I have quoted. 

9. The progress of education in America has been due 
in great measure to active public interest stimulated by 
newspaper suggestions. The -prominence given this year 
to the specific criticisms referred to calls for attention in 
order that the benefit intended by their publication may be 
secured. 

ABILITY TESTS BY EMPLOYERS 

10. I submit an account of an investigation suggested 
by the criticisms upon elementary school graduates. 

1 1 . Twenty -five elementary school principals in various 
parts of the Borough of Brooklyn made a canvass to 
determine in what business houses their wage-earning 
graduates were engaged in the largest numbers. The 
superintendents of the two firms which were shown to 
be the most extensive employers were asked to give 
specimen tasks most commonly required of elementary 
school graduates in their employ and bearing upon the 
abihty of graduates "to write, to spell, and to figure." 
These tasks are: 



[4] 



1. Addition: a sum. of about this difficulty: 



1.58 
.65 
49 

2.98 
10.77 

1.38 

3.10 



2. Penmanship, multiplication, fractions, addition, filling 
out a sales slip about like this one from dictation, computing 
the values, and adding the amounts: 



Bought by. 



Henry Wise 

6^9 Classon Ave. 

Brooklyn 



Sales No. 
163 


Carrier 
15 


Charge 

Ck. 


Date 

5/16/15 


Quantity 


Items 


.\mount 


2 3/4 


White Lace @ 57c 






3 


Spools White Silk @ 10c 






1 3/i. 


White Silk @ 93c 






























.\mou 


nt 



3. Spelling, grammar, composition, general intelligence: 
"Write a letter to Hiram Moller, 275 Ocean 
Ave., Far Rockaway. He has bought a new 
house there. Invite him to look over our new 

[5] 




THE MESSAGE TEST 

stock of furnishings. Feature the most im- 
portant ones. Attract him to the store." 
4. Attention. Carrying messages: 

"Have one person direct the messenger to tell 
the other person in a distant room that the letter 
sent by the former regarding repairs and referring 
to a list of them was received but there was no 
list enclosed. Get it." 

12. These tests I applied to pupils of the graduating 
classes of the Brooklyn divisions. Following are the results. 

13. Test No. 1. Simple addition : 

Number tested 1023 

Number right 778 

Per cent, right 76% 

Poorest class record 68 % 

Best class record 91 % 

14. Test No. 2. Penmanship, multiplication, frac- 
tions, addition, sales slip : 

Number tested 962 

Number right 539 

Per cent, right 66 % 

Poorest class record 42 % 

Best class record 92% 

15. Test No. 3. Grammatical letter from suggested 
matter : 

Number tested 410 

[6] 



Form, appearance, penmanship, on scale of 100 perfect: 

41 rated at 100 10% 

39 rated at 95 9.5% 

124 rated at 90 30.3% 

16 rated at 85 3.9% 

60 rated at 80 14.6% 

32 rated at 75 7.8% 

18 rated at 70 , 4.4% 

12 rated at 65 2.9% 

28 rated at 60 6.8% 

36 rated at 50 8.8% 

4 rated at 40 1 % 

Errors in spelling and capitalization: 

82 with errors 20 % 

88 with 1 error 21.5% 

70 with 2 errors 17 . 1 % 

75 with 3 errors 18.3% 

35 with 4 errors 8.5% 

31 with 5 errors 76% 

9 with 6 errors 2.2% 

10 with 7 errors 2.4% 

5 with 8 errors 1.2% 

3 with 9 errors . 7 % 

2 with 10 errors . . . 5 % 

Errors in punctuation : 

110 with errors 26.8% 

49 with 1 error 12 % 

61 with 2 errors 14 .9% 

40 with 3 errors 9.8% 

67 with 4 errors 16.3% 

53 with 5 errors . 12.9% 

4 with 6 errors 1 % 

6 with 7 errors 1.5% 

10 with 8 errors 2.4% 

6 with 9 errors 1.5% 

3 with 10 errors .7% 

1 with 11 errors .2% 

[7] 



Blemishes, blots, erasures, corrections, and words omitted 
or rewritten; 



58 wi 

22 w 
106 w 

24 w 
142 w 

28 w 
9 w 

5 w 

6 w 
5 wi 
3 w 

w 

1 w 
1 w 



th 
th 
th 
th 
th 
th 
th 
th 
th 
th 



errors 14 , 

1 error 5 , 

2 errors 25 

3 errors 5 



5 errors . 

6 errors . 

7 errors . 

8 errors . 

9 errors . 
th 10 errors, 
th 11 errors, 
th 12 errors . 
th 13 errors. 



6.8% 

2.2% 

1.2% 

1.5% 

1.2% 

.7% 

% 

.2% 

.2% 



16. Test No. 4. Carrying messages: 

Number tested 91 

Number correct 56 

Per cent, correct 62% 



SELF-CORHECTION 

17. In the mathematical tests, a tendency to prove 
the work before handing it in was almost entirely lacking. 
There is in the children an idea that speed is valuable 
apart from correctness. I recall that from the tests 
given by S. A. Courtis he made the generalization that 
the average accuracy of New York school children is 
very low, while the speed is above the average. That is, 
it takes us less time to get a thing wrong here than it does 
in the average school system. I cannot believe that an 
absurdity of this kind would not yield in great measure 
to an organization of the Brooklyn divisions into a work- 
ing unit to promulgate specific efficiencies in directions 
where investigation shows a common need and to provide 
for systematic follow-up processes, until the formation of 

[8] 




GREAT SPEED — BUT WHAT HAVE TOU WHEN YOD GET THERE? 

habits of self-correction in mathematical work becomes 
a recognized obligation of every teacher and principal. 
In one school every column is required to be added up 
and down to an agreement before the adder attempts the 
next column. 

18. I can see the justice which leads some teachers to 
aUow children some credit for correctness of method 
even when the result is wrong, but no school usage is 
more ridiculed by the lay critic. For him a wrong result 
is useless no matter how slowly or how quickly obtained. 




IN SCHOOL SHE ACCEPTS 60% RIGHT; BUT AT THE BANK - 



19. The school habit of accepting 60% as "satisfactory" 
is ridiculed as tending to promulgate a 60% civilization. 

[9] 



VALUE OF THE DEPARTMENT-STOEE TEST 

20. Without going into the question whether a school 
system is a failure whose "graduates cannot spell, write, 
or figure," one may enquire whether the tests proposed 
by the department-store superintendents represent ac- 
complishments which a principal of a school should be 
held responsible to secure in his graduates. There was 
opportunity of asking thirty-one principals that question 
specifically. Each answered independently that these 
are requirements which may fairly be exacted of him. 
Experiments were then made as to how long it would 
take to bring a graduating class to the point where its 
maximum efficiency in these abilities could be counted 
on. This problem was set for graduating class teachers 
of mathematics. "Teach self -correction of mathematical 
exercises of the kind proposed by the department-store 
superintendents. Note the time you spend each day, and 
when the efficiency runs fairly constant notify me to 
come and confirm your record by a similar test." 

These are sample reports: 

21. Test No. 1. Easy addition. Self-correction: 

jj , Time spent by class Number Number Per cent, 

and teacher tested right right 

May 12 8 min. 35 28 80 

13 5 min. 34 30 89 

14 5 min. 35 32 92 

17 4 min. 35 31 90 

18 5 min. 32 31 90 

18 4 min. 35 34 97 

20....... 5 min. 35 35 100 

21 4 min. 34 34 100 

24 3 min. 34 34 100 

25 3 min. 34 34 100 

26 3 min. 34 34 100 

26 Test by division 

superintendent 34 32 94 



[10] 



This class reached maximum efficiency for teacher's 
test in thirty-nine minutes distributed through six days. 

22. Test No. 2. Sales sHp, penmanship, multipHca- 
tion, fractions, addition, filling of headings. 



r, . Time lipent bv class 

^^^' anA teacher 

May 12 . 15 min. 

13 10 min. 

14 10 min. 

17 10 min. 

18 1'2 min. 

19 8 min. 

20 8 min. 



21 8 min. 

24 8 min. 

25 8 min. 

26 10 min. 

27 8 min. 

28 8 min. 



28 Test by division 

superintendent 29 28 96 

This class reached maximum efficiency for teacher s test 
in one hour forty-seven minutes distributed through eleven 
days. 

INFLUENCE OF EXAMINER 

23. One of the principals, after a test by me, remarked 
that the presence of a stranger decreases the efficiency 
of the children. My test showed 82 % correct. He gave 
an equivalent test in my presence with a result of 97%. 
In one school the test given in "the grand manner" with 
apparent fear in some of the children secured a result of 
62 9c- ^Ve then sang together "There's a Light still 

[11] 



Number 
tested 


Number 
right 


Per cent, 
right 


30 


18 


61 


30 


22 


74 


30 


24 


80 


30 


22 


74 


29 


28 


96 


29 


28 


96 


30 


28 


93 


30 


29 


97 


30 


29 


97 


29 


29 


100 


29 


28 


96 


29 


29 


100 


29 


29 


100 



burning in the Window" and tried an equivalent test, 
securing a result of 90 %, and immediately after with one 
of the same sort we secured 96 %. I give these appar- 
ently trivial details to support the opinion that, with- 
out much trouble, our grad- 
uates can be found by their 
employers to have the abiUty 
to "spell, write, and figure," 
and that our schools are able 
without strain to prepare grad- 
uates so that the principals can 
guarantee such ability and sub- 
stantiate the guarantee by re- 
cords of actual performance. 
Ability that is at command 
under trying cir- 
cumstances is so 
much of an asset 
that a test by a 
stranger is a valu- 
able exercise. 







EXAMINING IN THE GRAND MANNER, NOTE THE 
QUAKING CHILDREN 



GUESSES AND RESULTS 



24. In fifteen cases the test was shown to principals 
before giving it. Their estimate of the success of the 
class in it was obtained. Comparison of estimate with 
results runs like this: 



Principal's guess 






Actual result 


100% 






73% 


95% 






42% 


90% 






73% 


etc. 






etc. 


cipal guessed as 


low 


as 


73 %. Most principals 



thought 100 % ought to be expected. 

[12] 



VARIATIONS IN SCHOOLS 

25. There is no discoverable relation between the 
results and "the nature of the district" of the school. 
Very well-dressed children ranked high and low. Poor 
neighborhoods showed similar diversity. But schools 
standing low, tested again, did not reach a high standard 
until more drill on these specific tasks had been given 
than was necessary in schools standing higher. That the 
graduating classes of any Brooklyn school should surprise 
their principals by as low a result as 42 % on so simple a 
requirement and that all the classes with so small an 
expenditure of time so materially improved their record, 
leads me to submit some observations looking to organi- 
zation of these divisions next year. 

GETTING THE KNACK AND THE PLEASURE 

26. Observers of habit formation have noticed that 
in learning to swim, to play tennis or cards or a musical 
instrument, or to ride a bicycle, there is a preliminary 
period of more or less discouraging attempts during which 
practice is mostly drudgery. This is apparent also in 
the study of foreign languages. After drill, the cells of 
the brain, often with apparent suddenness, seem to group 
themselves in new relations, and one feels he has the 
knack. After this, practice is attended with much less 
dulness. I have seen this come in students of Latin and of 
geometry at different times for different boys. Observation 
of elementary school children inclines me to believe that 
many of them reach such a state that making combina- 
tions of quantities becomes pleasurable to them, and 
that ihe children who "do not like arithmetic" can, by 
skilful and sympathetic guidance, he brought to the point 
where the knack comes to them, and that thenceforward such 
children are permanently changed in capacity. 

[13] 




THE JOY OP ACHIEVEMENT 



27. I should like to be able, in large schools where 
facilities for it are abundant, to put in a program sys- 
tematically engaging the arithmetically efficient children 
upon some other work part of the time, while the unsteady 
ones in large groups could be exercised with conscious 
attempt to get pleasure out of computation. Precaution 
would need to be taken not to emphasize mere drill. 

28. Continued unsuccessful drudgery stupefies the 
mind. The consciousness of success and of growth felt 
and enjoyed by the learner himself seems to me a healthy 
stimulus which can be nursed by the right kind of teacher, 
selected because of this power. The scheme proposed is 
a modification of the "opportunity class" idea, extended 
to children who are normal but in specific abilities have 
been hurried along without the happy experience of 
waking up to find themselves possessed of the knack. 



INTEREST AND DRILL 



29. I have not seen in the Brooklyn divisions any- 
thing in the line of interesting drill as good as what I 
saw seventeen years ago, in Public School 5, Brooklyn, 

[14] 



tm&mi 



AN ARITHMETIC ASSEMBLY IN PCBUC SCHOOL 5 

when Principal William T. Vlymen used to have an 
assembly drill in the fundamental processes of arithmetic 
every day. The interest, which I take it is the most 
ini{)ortant factor in nutritive drill, was pronounced. The 
importance of the occasion — large numbers present, 
principals and teachers observing, a sort of figure-fest, 
short, cheerful, and considerate — was a harmless but 
efficient spur to industry, care, and success. I recom- 
mend this feature to the attention of principals in the 
division. 

EXHIBITIONS OF ABILITY 

30. Although it occurred in a division not assigned to 
me, I should like to record, for the benefit of the Brook- 
lyn principals, a contest managed by Mr. Walter H. 
Eddy, of the High School of Commerce. The various 
classes have in their own rooms "try outs" in addition, 
subtraction, multiplication, division, vulgar fractions, 
decimal fractions, and percentage. The best boys of 
each group then contest in the assembly hall. Each has 
a blackboard. At the same moment identical problems 
on slips of paper are handed to the contestants. WTien 
a boy has completed and proved his work, he takes his 
position at a designated place at the front of the stage; 

[15] 




AN ARITHMETIC RELAY RACE IN PUBUC SCHOOL Hi 

successive contestants fall in as they finish. The exer- 
cises are so short that they involve no strain. I recom- 
mend that this means of putting spirit into arithmetic 
be introduced into the Brooklyn schools for contests 
both between classes and between schools. I recognize 
that arithmetic, as it is the most usually tested of sub- 
jects, is also the most dangerous to mental health if 
overdone. I couple with my suggestion a caution which 
may be necessary only to principals not known to me, 
that the prelmiinaries be conducted with moderation. 

31. During the year the Brooklyn Daily Eagle conducted 
a spelling contest in which public interest was keen. The 
revival of this old-fashioned school exercise in the form 
of friendly contests between schools is recommended. 



USE OF THE CRITICISMS OF THE YEAR 

32. The tests made may be interpreted to show that 
in some of the schools in the division assigned to me, too 
many of the members of the graduating classes apparently 
could not "spell, WTite, and figure." I know that it is 
not customary to make such admissions in school reports, 

[16] 





TWO USES OF CRITICISM 



but recofjnition of the criticism seems to me to lead to 
some advantage. As long as the schools depend on public 
indorsement for their maintenance, why not court suggestions 
for improvement from the public? When a service es- 
tabhshes itself on a sohd foundation, its managers often 
inspire the staff with a pride of efficiency sufficient to 
lead to an invitation for suggested betterments. I know 
several schools in Brooklyn that are strong enough to 
print on their report cards, "Patrons are requested to 
suggest improvements desired in our service." I think 
both divisions would profit by a frank invitation to the 
public to suggest what abilities it expects in a school 
graduate. The commercial employers on whom I called 
were interested. Later in this report you will find their 
contribution. 



WHAT A BROOKLYN GRADUATE SHOULD BE 

33. The purpose which led the builders of America 
to establish for the first time in history a plan of free and 
universal education was expressly to rear a race of citi- 
zens superior to existing humanity. No expounder of the 
function of public education in the early days of the 
repubhc or at the present time has been content with 

[17] 



spelling, writing, and figuring as the result of school 
training. The culture of better men and women has 
been the theoretical aim of American schools from the 
beginning. 

34. Would it be possible to define profitably for the 
Brooklyn schools the personal product to deliver which 
they are maintained? Such a formulation has engaged 
the attention of managers of school systems to an increas- 
ing degree in the past twenty-five years. 

35. Starting with the specific attainments the lack of 
which have been emphatically asserted this year and 
extensively advertised throughout the country, I added 
to the list other virtues given me by employers as needful. 
I submitted the list to ministers, lawyers, and various 
citizens, and to thirty Brooklyn principals, asking for 
corrections and additions. Striking out the repetitions 
and the different forms of expressing the same idea, I 
present herewith young Master or Miss Brooklyn as he 
or she, certificate in hand, theoretically walks down the 
front steps of the perfect school on graduation day. 

36. Conceive a boy or girl made up of these charac- 
teristics : 

Health, agility, cleanliness, good posture. 

Good personal appearance. Attention to dress, erect 
figure. 

Audible voice, clear and correct speech. 

Self-control, ability to look you in the eye, courage, 
absence of the impediment of shyness. 

Deftness of hand, including legible, shapely penman- 
ship, power of simple graphic representation, ability 
to use common tools and simple machines. 

Punctuality; economy of time and material. 

Ability and tendency to think, to compare ideas, and 
to reach consistent conclusions. 

[18] 



Tendency to reflect before important action. 

Mental economy. Ability to study a problem intelli- 
gently and to summarize essentials in a reasonable 
time; intelligent application. 

Orderlines.s. Tendency to plan. 

Ability to comprehend and to reproduce in writing or 
by word of mouth printed or oral discourse of reason- 
able difficulty. 

Accuracy and reasonable speed in such computations 
as the ordinary citizen is called upon to make and in 
such quantitative work with tools and material as is 
pertinent to the tool and machine work of the school. 

Appreciation of the value of money, of the advantage 
of intelligent spending, and of thrift. 

An efficient knowledge of the usual sources of informa- 
tion. Skill in using them. 

Conception of the intellectual inheritance of mankind. 
Possession of a reasonable fund of information 
resulting from the conventional studies, including 
especially the duties of a citizen. 

Knowledge of the main avenues of self-support, the 
nature of occupations, wages, and opportunities. 

Taste, refinement, appreciation of beauty in literature, 
music, art, and nature. 

Humor, cai)acity for healthy enjoyment, cheerfulness. 

Desire and ability to cooperate with others. Willing- 
ness to act under direction; loyalty. 

Intelligent patriotism. 

Industry, perseverance, grip, grit, self-reliance. 

Originality, independence, initiative, management, en- 
thusiasm. 

Honesty, decency, clean-mindedness. 

Good manners, couite.sy, consideration for others, 
helpfulness, readiness to volunteer, unselfishness. 

Advantageous use of leisure. 

[19] 



./ 






,"'' 

^"^ r 



/^ 






0' .<!:^\<^ 



/:^^ 



/^ 




WHAT 18 A PRINCIPAL FOR? 



All-round capacity, harmonious development. 
Consciousness of a personal ideal. 

Ambition to make the most of opportunities indi- 
vidually and as a contributor to the common good. 



WHAT A SCHOOL AND A PRINCIPAL ARE FOR 

37. There is nothing new in the list. All this has been 
said by writers on education before. Clergymen cover, 
year after year, virtues which they hope to propagate. 
The picture of my ideal graduate, however, was made in 
Brooklyn. My proposition is that I use it as more than 
a fanciful sketch - — as an architect's plan or a specifica- 
tion for the one hundred and seventy-five contractors 
engaged in supervising character-building in the borough. 
That is, / should tike to see practice officially diverted from 
concentration on a course of study to conscious cultivation 
of human habits, traits, and tendencies. 

38. Analysis of human knowledge into literature, 
science, and classified subdivisions has long been made 
for purposes of teaching. It has saddled memory methods 
upon schools so long that a large part of preparation, 
recitation, and testing is concerned with information. 

[20] 



Though current educational theory repudiates the idea 
that the information of the textbooks is an education, 
Brooklyn practice, like American usage at large, does 
not put growth of power, acquisition of habit, in a fore- 
most place; nor does it exhibit the course of study as the 
means, not the end, of service. Brooklynites show that 
they can conceive the product desired of the schools and 
can analyze it into definite abilities capable of nurture by 
selected persons employing selected means. I should 
wish, in the division assigned to me, to promote a more 
direct application of practice to the generally accepted 
theory that the schools are maintained to provide "edu- 
cation for efficiency" (Maxwell), "a thinking, doing, 
feeling person" (Kirk), "a personal product" (Eliot), 
"a citizen, not a storehouse" (Jordan), "folks, not 
facts" (William Hawley Smith). 

39. The working proposition is: A Brooklyn school is 
maintained to cultivate abilities of all its children as nearly 
toward perfection as the limitations of school time and 
children's aptitudes permit. A principal is employed to 
see that this purpose of the school is carried out. A 
compilation of these abilities can be obtained from intelli- 
gent citizens, can be classified for working efficiency by 
school managers, and can serve as a prospectus for the 
work of a definite time. 

40. The summary is a local product and has not been 
tested by application to individual schools, but it meets 
all the criticism of the year and includes all the virtues 
that business men have mentioned as essential in gradu- 
ates. It contains the expectations of citizens and school- 
masters and it gives a principal something in the nature 
of a defined ideal for himself and for the person who 
supervises him. 

41. Without a clear plan, a manager is the servant of 
circumstances as they arise. He reacts upon each adven- 

[21] 




titious demand as it comes up. He looks back upon his 
day and wonders where it has gone. His work masters 
him. With a plain working model, a man may be more 
the owner of his time and can better bend events to his 
will. A person assigned to administer and supervise a 
division, a group of schools, ought to assist the principals 
of those schools to realize the products expected of the 
schools. To do this haphazard is a waste. Superinten- 
dency ought by this time to have formulated some of the 
lessons of experience into something approaching a science. 

THE SCIENCE OF SUPERVISION 

42. 

EN or more years' output of "efficiency" 
books and articles have affected the manage- 
ment of Brooklyn schools. A number of the 
principals and teachers are familiar with the 
works of H. B. Gantt, Herbert Kaufman, 
Harrington Emerson, and others. Emerson's summary 
of efficient management common to most kinds of or- 
ganization has been quoted to some extent in courses 
taken by Brooklyn teachers. The supervision of a school 
or of a division is benefited by knowledge of the require- 
ments outlined by him. They are: 
Ideals — kept clear and prominent. 
Revision — change of ideals to meet changing conditions. 
Efficiency standards. 
Efficiency tests. 
Efficiency records. 
Efficiency rewards. 
Discipline of stafiF. 
Standard cost. 

IDEALS AND REVISIONS 

43. Even the business organizations now emphasize 
the necessity of keeping alive in every member of the 

[22] 




EV'ERY BUSINESS ORGANIZATION NEEDS EFFICIENCY CONFERENCES 



staff high ideals of efficiency. Provision for this feature in 
school systems is universally demanded. In no service is 
stagnation and formalism more dangerous than in ours. 
There exist in Brooklyn very efficient agencies for pro- 
moting high ideals and for keeping them up to date. 

I do not know of any community in which teachers and 
principals in such large proportionate numbers make a 
study of the purposes and methods of teaching as is the 
case in Brooklyn. Adelphi College, St. John's College, 
Polytechnic Institute, and the Brooklyn Institute of 
Arts and Sciences have maintained for several years 
schools of education largely attended by teachers in serv- 
ice. I learned of many teachers and principals who have 
attended and will attend summer schools of pedagogy. 
In three schools in which I made a canvass I found the 
following numbers enrolled in professional courses since 
September, 1914 

Number of Taking Percent, 

teachers courses 

School A 52 31 60 

School B 30 12 40 

School C 30 11 S7 

112 54 48 

This does not take into consideration any teachers 
taking courses any other year. 

C23] 




1 NEVER READ A BOOK ON PEDAGOGY IN MY LIFE 

44. In the same schools the number of teachers sub- 
scribing to professional magazines is: 

Number of Number Per cent, 
teachers subscribing 



School A 


52 


25 


38 


School B 


30 


8 


27 


School C 


30 


9 


30 



112 



42 



37 



45. In these schools the number of teachers who have 
read since September what you would consider professional 
books is fifty per cent, of the entire number of teachers 
who were questioned. When you recall the applause from 
a large assemblage of teachers which greeted the head of 
one of Brooklyn's prominent schools when he said in 
1892, "I never read a book on pedagogy in my life, thank 
God," you can see some difference in the way some of the 
Brooklyn school men and women regard the value of aids 
which freshen and revise ideals. I have not heard in 

[24] 



Brooklyn for many years the old excuse for stagnation: 
"A teacher is born and not made." 

46. The membership in professional organizations is 
larger than in any commvmity of which I know. The 
Brooklyn Eagle Almanac lists forty-sLx associations, the 
largest of which have memberships of 1901, 3744, and 
5891 respectively. 

The most remarkable local organization of school work- 
ers in the world is the Brooklyn Teachers' Association. 
Beginning its career forty-one years ago with a lecture 
on "The Ideal Schoolmistress," the society has, for more 
than thirty years, conducted professional classes for 
teachers until the number of its members has grown to 
5985. Of these, 2794 teachers enrolled themselves in 
the professional classes supported by the Association 
during the .school year just closing. Last year 3046 
teachers pursued the Association's studies. The work 
includes history of education, philosophy of education, 
principles of education, educational p.sychology, class 
management, administration methods, as well as sixty- 
five classes in academic subjects, a total of eighty-six 
courses offered. Seventy -seven of these were chosen by 
a sufficient number of teachers to warrant the employ- 
ment of instructors. This is a professional university, 
self-sustaining, managed by school men and women, the 
most democratic educational foundation in America. It is 
such a guild as in the Renaissance formed itself to learn 
of the leading scholars of the time and gave its name, 
universitas or corporation, to the highest type of school 
there is. 

47. But there are more than 6000 teachers and prin- 
cipals in the Brooklyn divisions. Definition and revi- 
sion of ideals cannot be left to even so efficient an agency 
as a voluntary society which instructs fifty per cent, of 
the teachers of the entire borough. I find other school 

[25] 



systems making more use of assemblages of teachers for 
elucidation of the large purposes of schools than is em- 
ployed in Brooklyn. In Chicago, in November, I attended 
such a meeting in which the superintendent spoke, out- 
lining large policies of 
school work and pre- 
senting to the meet- 
ing different teachers 
who described experi- 
ments and successes 
of the schoolroom. It 
was more like an 
engineers' or physi- 
cians' convention 
than any other teach- 
ers' meeting I have 
seen. The superin- 
tendent's summary 
contained these 
words: "The only 
powers that can 
change inertness to progress are responsibility and freedom. 
Teachers must understand that improvement is needed 
not merely in the ways of meeting requirements but in 
changing old usages to something better. Long compli- 
ance creates a spirit contented and willing. Out of a 
custom that gave superintendents the duty of setting 
standards has evolved an administrative power which 
tends to keep things as they are. The thumbs up, thumbs 
down superintendent is a menace to progress. Old stand- 
ards have been sent to the scrap heap by industry and 
commerce, by applied science, by genetic history, by 
social and spiritual growth. Teaching used to be static, 
— the conservation of what had been established by the 
powers above. Real education is perpetual adjustment 
[26] 




THE THUMBS UP SUPERINTENDENT 



to the changing times. A supervisor must inspire his 
charges to discover things needful arid to do them." 

48. The Chicago organization for refreshment of ideals 
requires each assistant superintendent to conduct educa- 
tional meetings. Attendance of the principals and teach- 
ers is voluntary. All principals can find such meetings 
in progress on Saturdays from 10.30 to 1'2 once a month. 
On other Saturdays there are other teachers' conferences 
to which principals also may go. The result of these con- 
ferences — two hundred fifty-six pages of recommenda- 
tions on all the aims, methods, and successes of all grades 
of .schools; plans of administration, of child-study, of 
social efficiency, of vocational guidance, of luncheon serv- 
ice — is a contribution of teachers, principals, and super- 
intendents that has no recent parallel in the Brooklyn 
divisions. When I compare Chicago superintendents' 
use of Saturday mornings with our New York office hour 
for listening to personal communications which, were 
they written, would be much shorter and more definite 
than now, it seems to me that the Westerners have us 
beaten as conservers of energy. 

49. Another provision for outlining and enlivening 
ideals in Chicago is an official magazine issued free to 
every teacher in the system. The Board of Education 
edits, prints, and distributes this literature of the pro- 
fession. Announcements, directions, expositions of edu- 
cational doctrine, reports of the Saturday meetings, make 
up the matter. Teachers contribute. They frankly pre- 
sent views differing from those proposed by supervisors. 

50. Insurance companies, electric plants, railways, 
maintain regular periodicals for dissemination of ideals 
among their employes. The supervision of 6000 persons 
engaged in more important work than lighting, insuring 
or transporting, requires a periodic issue of bright, vital- 
izing print as much as any commercial business does. 

[27] 



We should attempt through the Brooklyn Teachers' 
Association to circulate an organ devoted to the first 
principles of efficient management: dissemination and 
revision of clearly defined ideals. We should cooperate 
with the Association in free-for-all conferences to take 
the place of the Saturday office hour and should use these 
conferences for the definition and application of modern 
educational ideals. 

51. During the year, as far as opportunity offered, I 
have recommended to those in the Brooklyn divisions 
study and application of suggestions found in the publi- 
cations of the Board of Education's Division of Refer- 
ence and Research. I recommend that next year the 
superintendent assigned to the Brooklyn divisions hold 
volunteer conferences upon reports of the Division of 
Research with the intent to realize profit to the Brooklyn 
schools. 

EFFICIENCY STANDARDS 
52. 

N page 17 of this report, under the title 
"What a Brooklyn Graduate Should Be," 
I have presented ideals collated from propo- 
sitions of Brooklyn teachers and other citi- 
zens. In paragraph 11 I have given some eflSciency 
standards submitted by merchants for some of the 
ideal qualities required of the schools. It is not a 
difficult matter to arrive at definite standards of the 
attainments asked for by the employer. The promi- 
nence given this year to business men's criticism leads 
me to propose for any division assigned to me to invite a 
conference of employers and to obtain from them an agree- 
ment upon explicit performances which a public school 
graduate ought to be certain of accomplishing. These I will 
submit to such principals as will meet me with the intent 
to accept those standards or to indicate to the business 
[28] 





AUDIBLE VOICE IS NOT HARD TO MAKE 



men's committee what standards are not acceptable and 
why not. I would then meet such members of local school 
boards and such principals as would come together and 
would discuss with them the other than business attain- 
ments and virtues which a common school boy or girl 
should be trained in. We should arrange the.se in groups 
of ".special emphasis," "regular emphasis," and "inci- 
dental," from the point of view of the schools' duty and 
opportunity. We should formulate such standards of 
attainment in lines capable of standardization as we 
could, and would give the conclusions of the conference 
official indorsement as a prospectus of ideals e.vpected 
in the human individuals for whose education the schools 
are maintained. 

53. For example, a standard of efficiency for graduating 
cla.ss pupils in the general line of "audible voice, clear and 
correct speech" is not hard to make; neither is one in 
"penmanship, power of simple graphic representation" 
or in "ability to comprehend and to rejjroduce in writing 
or by word of mouth printed or oral discourse of reason- 
able difficulty." Efficiency standards for many of the 
ideals are already well known to .schoolmasters. 

[29] 




FORMAL GETTING THRODGH THE COURSE OF STUDY WILL NOT BE 
ACCEPTED AS THE FUNCTION OP THE SCHOOL SYSTEM 



54. It is no disparagement of this proposition to say, 
"All this has been done before." Managers of school 
systems are translating their courses of study into human 
results all the time. It needs to be done so often in 
every system that formal getting through the course of 
study will not be accepted as the function of the school 
system. We want to know that the course of study has 
been so used that advantageous human results have 
ensued. 

55. Efficiency ideals properly include propositions that 
are new and in advance of what many principals and 
teachers may have considered within the sphere of their 
service. Efficiency stayidards are definite attainments 
which a supervisor, if he is worth his salary, will require 
every school to reach. They are minima below which a 
principal or teacher must not fall without loss of rewards 
provided for efficiency. There is a strong undercurrent 
of belief in Brooklyn that no teacher after three years 
upon the payroll can be relieved of drawing salary, no 
matter how poor his service. The men whose main duty 
it is to keep the tax rate down charge that the Depart- 
ment of Education is paying high-grade wages for low- 

[30] 



grade work. We lack standards of work that are being 
consistently employed. We need definitely to establish 
whether a designated teacher is below grade or not. 

56. I could not make an acceptable set of standards 
for the eight grades in an elementary school, but I know 
twenty-two principals and teachers with whom I could 
make a beginning on which I think a scheme of standards 
could be built that would have a tonic effect upon the 
work of every school whose principal would elect to use 
the measure. I recommend a beginning in Brooklyn next 
year. 

EFFICIENCY RECORDS 

57. All the standard works on efficiency emphasize 
the necessity of "reliable, immediate, adequate, and per- 
manent records." 

58. When the newspapers which circulate in the divi- 
sions assigned to me made prominent in their news and in 
editorials the charges that the elementary school gradu- 
ates cannot write, spell, or figure, I should have had at 
my hand reliable data showing in what Brooklyn scliools 
the children were able to a commendable degree to write, 
.spell, and figure. I asked for the records of certain Brook- 
lyn schools and learned that there were no reports of 
the efficiency of these schools and none had been re- 
quire<l for some time. If I were superintendent of a 
steamboat service and the newspapers published a state- 
ment that my ships could not make connections with 
trains as advertised, had insufficient life preservers, and 
were too weak in the timbers for safety, I should be 
expected to be able to produce time records, reports of 
government hull inspectors, and certificates of equipment. 

59. The school is the working unit of a system and 
ought to be inspected periodically. A record of its effi- 
ciency ought to be made in duplicate, one copy for the 

[31] 




CANDIDATING FOR PROMOTION OUGHT NOT TO BE REQUrRED 



principal and one readily available to the officers admin 
istering and supervising the division to which the schoo 
belongs. Recognition and reward of success of principal; 
is haphazard without definite efficiency records of th( 
principal's work. An associate superintendent has tc 
vote upon the nomination of some principal for a highei 
position. There are more than 400 principals to choose 
from. No reasonable decision can be made relying onlj 
on memory, or on an impression made by the persona! 
call of the candidate, or on the statement of one who had 
walked through the school letting casual impressions 
guide his judgment. It is too much as if the persons 
considered had appeared newly on the scene from some 
other system. With the present method of nominating 
principals for higher places and relying upon the can- 
didate's own announcement of his desire for nomination, 
there is a strong possibility that some of the best managerial 
talent in the system is overlooked because its possessor is 
Tunning a solid, efficient school without its excellence being 
able to offset his poor work in self-advancement. The 
number of principals in the Brooklyn divisions who feel 
there is too little regard for records of achievement based 
upon tests of results is considerable. It would, in my 
opinion, be a great advantage to the Brooklyn schools if 
details for record were known by the principals and if 
[32] 



those records were periodically made. An idea of an 
efficiency record for a principal may be obtained from 
the following compilation furnished by Brooklyn men 
and women: 

Record of John Smith, Principal, School 500, Brooklyn, made 

by 

Dates of school inspection 

Amount of time each date 





CHECK IN PROPER COLUMN 




Excellent: 
much 
above 
average 


Very good: 
above 
average 


Good: 
average 


Poor: 
below 
average 


(a) Here put results op 
principal's management as 
found by testing the 
PUPILS. Enclose as part of 

THE RECOKI) THE ACTUAL 
TESTS MADE AND THE RE- 
SULTS. The basis op this 

RECORD IS THE CULTIVATION 
OF THOSE HABITS, ABILITIES, 
AND CHARACTERISTICS O F 
PUPILS THAT SHALL BE DE- 
CIDED UPON AS IN PAR.VGRAPH 
39 OF THIS REPORT. DETAILS 
TO BE PRINTED HERE 

(fc) Principal's habit of and 
provision for carrying out re- 
quirements of the Hoard of 
Education as expressed in 
its bv-law.s, regulations, and 
resolutions and in instruc- 
tions issued by the superin- 
tendents 










(c) Principal's method of 
filing these instructions for 
reference 










(d) Principal's direction 
of plans of teachers for school 
work 

















[33] 





CHECK IN PROPER COLUMN 




Eicellcnt: 

much 

above 

average 


Very good: 
above 
average 


Good: 
average 


Poor: 

below 
average 


(<■) His record of class in- 










(/) His record of confer- 
ences with teachers 










(g) His provision for in- 
struction of newly appointed 
teachers, of substitutes, and 
of teachers whose work is 
weak. His record of assist- 










{h) Promptness and accu- 










(i) Economy and care as 
to books and supplies 










(j) Condition of building, 
reports of damage and need 
of repairs, cleanliness, adorn- 
ment of rooms and halls, heat 
and ventilation, supervision 
of janitor 










(k) Management of fire 
drills 










(I) Principal's punctual- 
ity and attendance 










(m) Records of punctu- 
ality and attendance of 










(n) Records of punctu- 
ality and attendance of 










(o) Management of grad- 
ing and promotions 










(p) Discipline and spirit 










(q) Recesses, games, ath- 




















(s) Patriotic exercises . . 





















[34] 





CHECK IN PROPER COLUMN 




Excellent: 

much 

above 

average 


Very good : 
above 
average 


Good: 
average 


Poor: 

below 

average 


(t) Contribution of sug- 
geations of benefit to school 
system 










(u) Special excellencies or 
deficiencies. Details not 
listed above, but considered 
worthy of mention 





















60. I would not put into effect a system of efficiency 
records of principals until I had submitted such a tenta- 
tive draft as this to all who were to be affected by it. I 
would amend it in accordance with suggestions received. 
I should expect to have it revised as experience showed 
the need. 

61. During the present year a number of members of 
the Board of Education have urged the need of "organiza- 
tion for results." One asserts that hospitals, libraries, 
churches, and philanthropic societies have better efficiency 
records than we have. The principal of one Brooklyn 
school expresses the view that a director of a large educa- 
tional plant has as much need of tables of results as a bank 
has of its balance sheet or a store of its sales report. He 
.says, "Our rcjiorts are mostly concerned with attendance 
of pupils and teachers. They ought to be an account of 
educational profit." Another principal called my atten- 
tion to tlic assertions in Educational Adminiatration, by 
Strayer ami Thorndike, to the effect that "today the 
efficiency of school supervision is judged by its ability to 
satisfy any incpiiry which may be made concerning the 
work of teachers and the progress of pupils. The demand 
is made that claims be supported by statements of 

[35] 



results." ' This is the trend of requirement of supervision 
as indicated in current professional literature: "The su- 
pervisor should furnish the necessary stimulus to progress 

by careful study of the results 
attained by principals. These 
results compared with results 
attained by other principals 
should establish standards of 
method and spirit." ^ 

62. A notable fact in cur- 

rent educational history is the 

/||^H1^H y revival of importance placed 

' 11^ — ^^ upon scrutiny of results. 

Ayres says it is absorbed from 
the nation-wide movement 
for investigation of the results 
of every sort of organization, 
commercial, military, and 
social. "The people want 
to know the facts about 
the schools. They cannot be 
learned in an office." There 
has not been m the Brooklyn 
divisions this year nearly so 
much testing of the pupils' 
ability by inspectors as there was fifteen years ago. A 
superintendent then would go through a school from the 
bottom up, sampling and rating the pupils' specific abili- 
ties by exercises based upon what the syllabus for the 
grade provided and upon what the teacher said she had 
trained the children to do. Brooklyn principals who have 




THE REVIVAL OF IMPORTANCE 
PLACED UPON SCRUTINY OF 
RESULTS 



1 Educational Administration, Thorndike and Strayer, The Mac- 
millan Co., page 250. 

2 The Administration of Education, Hollister, Charles Scribner's 
Sons, page 235. 

[36] 





THE BEST TEST OF A PASTRY CDOK IS THE TASTE OF 
THE PIE 



remained in the sj'steni since that time tell me that they 
miss these investigations. One says, "A systematic trial 
of results like that discovers infelicities that the best of 
us do not see until an outsider finds them." Another 
says, "To sit in the back of a room and watch a teacher 
conduct a lesson is not enough. The test of good training 
is what the trained can do. The best test of a pastry 
cook is, first, the taste of the pie. After that has been 
evaluated, find whether the pie has been made economi- 
cally, hygienically, and with reasonable speed." I have 
not, in the Brooklyn division, adequate means of testing 
results. I do not know that the pupils arc as well equipped 
in the abilities and characteristics expected of school chil- 
dren as they may be made without any longer hours or 
harder work being re((Miretl of teachers, principals, and 
superintendents. If a rearrangement of emphasis and 
attention by school workers is desirable, I cannot base 
recommendation for such on any adequate knowledge of 

[37] 



what present emphasis and attention are producing. One 
assigned to '^administration and supervision of the schools 
of a division" ought to be so well fortified by actual testing of 
the product as to be able to invite any committee of citizens 
to test abilities that are so publicly questioned as was the 
case this year. Thus, as much prominence could be given 
to the skill of our graduates as was afforded the widely 
heralded charge that they cannot spell, write, or figure. 
There is not a sufficient force to do this available in 
Brooklyn at present. In 1899 these divisions had 118 
elementary .schools, a teaching and supervising staff of 
3496 persons, an enrolment of 163,783 pupils. Assigned 
exclusively to Brooklyn were nine district superintend- 
ents. At the beginning of this school year Brooklyn 
had 175 elementary schools, 6209 teachers, principals, 
and assistants, and 314,781 pupils. There are seven su- 
perintendents assigned to Brooklyn. If the number had 
increased in proportion to the number of schools, there 
would be thirteen Brooklyn superintendents. If the num- 
ber had increased in degree with the growth of the teach- 
ing staff, there would be fifteen superintendents working 
exclusively in Brooklyn at the beginning of the present 
year. A rough view of the duties of district superintend- 
ents seems sufficient to show that seven are not enough 
to do this work of testing. We ought to have it done by 
someone whose chief business it is, who will not be called 
away until the work in a particular school is completed. 
Such assistance is employed in all efficient organizations. 
It is essential to a school system. Lack of it exposes us 
to charges of specific failure in our product. We want 
skilful samplers who, from nine till three o'clock every 
day, will go quickly through the classes and give actual 
tests, who will not leave statistical tasks for teachers to 
score but who will do the entire work. I recommend that 
for Brooklyn there be selected, with approval of the prin- 
[38] 



cipals of the schools affected, two teachers for assignment, 
under the direction of the division superintendent, to test- 
ing results of teaching in the elementary schools. This 
will cost at a maximum $1500 per teacher plus a maximum 
of $20 carfare each. 

INSTANCES OF EFFICIENT ORGANIZATION 

63. This is a good place to record some specific in- 
stances of good management, so as to indicate what actual 
facts should go on the efficiency record of a principal. In 
some schools, you are impressed with the neatness and 
cleanliness of the building. The corners of the halls and 
stairs are well swept; the windows are clean; there is 
no litter on the floors of classrooms or hallways. If you 
inquire, you will find that even in so minor a matter as 
this the main features of scientific management are pres- 
ent: ideals published and kept alive, efficiency standards, 
eflBciency inspection, efficiency record, discipline of staff, 
eflSciency rewards. If you find a dirty building and 
remark it, the principal will tell you he has a poor janitor. 
Any manager of any other plant will tell you that sys- 
tematic inspection and definite record is the surest medi- 
cine known to cure a building of maljanitoritis. Sections 
115-6 of the By-laws consist entirely of efficiency stand- 
ards for janitor service. They are the formulation of 
experts of many years' experience. A janitor, good or 
careless, needs the tonic of inspection and report as much 
as a teacher or a principal does. Some Brooklyn prin- 
cipals to whom various janitors have been assigned never 
had a poor janitor. Why is that.' My observation is 
that the condition of the building is chiefly dependent on 
the administration of it planned and followed up by the 
principal. In buildings that are remarkably clean, attrac- 
tive resorts for teachers and children, examples in good 

[39] 



housekeeping for people living in all sorts of homes, I find 
systematic inspection and record. 

64. The cooperation of teachers and children in the 
care of public property as worked out in Public School 
43, Mr. J. A. O'Donnell, principal, is recommended as 
worth adoption. A teacher is appointed adviser of the 
sanitary squad of pupils. The squad is made up from 
such higher classes as have study periods distributed one 
after another throughout the day. At the opening of 
these study periods the designated patrols inspect the 
entire building as to stairs, hallways, toilets, and yards. 
They pick up, clean up, and make a record. Each teacher 
is responsible for maintaining an efEcient policing sys- 
tem in his own room. Mr. O'Donnell extends this kind 
of service to the streets contiguous to the school. Pupil 
offenders against the regulations are turned over to the 
court of the school city. 

65. A large number of tests of Brooklyn principals' 
managerial ability were made this year following the 
request of the Fire Commissioner for revision of regula- 
tions governing rapid dismissals. In order that all con- 
ditions existent in different schools might be met, the 
City Superintendent desired the collection of views of 
principals and teachers, and over two hundred persons 
contributed details of the circular issued in January. 
The propositions were submitted to the Fire Department 
and to the Committee on Buildings and modified by 
each. When finally approved by the parties who had 
proposed the changes, a circular was printed in the city 
newspapers and issued to the principals. Two editors 
made it the subject of extended comment. A hundred 
and three requests for copies were received from outside of 
the city. The principals in the two divisions took up the 
new requirements at once. The Brooklyn Daily Eagle later 
selected Public School 19, Brooklyn, as one in which the 

[40] 



new fire drill was conducted with such efficiency as to make 
it suitable for a model demonstration. Principal John W. 
Rafferty's conduct of the drill in the presence of Hon. 
Robert Adamson, the Fire Commissioner, was described 
in a full-page article and illustrated with photographs of 
different features of the drill. A complimentary copy 
was mailed to every Brooklyn principal. Subsequent 
inspection of fire drills in Brooklyn schools discovered 
generally a commendable degree of efficiency in this test 
of good organization and management. Fire drills in 
Public School 78, Mr. Wallace Newton, principal, and 
in Public School 139, Mr. Oliver C. Mordorf, principal, 
illustrate to a marked degree the proper management of 
large numbers of children massed together. The specific 
details of excellence in those schools in a rapid dismissal 
are these: 

There are no complex signals or directions. On receiv- 
ing the signal, the children form by twos in the classroom 
and march whithersoever the teacher directs. She uses 
her judgment in .selecting the exit out of which, at the 
moment, egress is lea.st impeded. She does not think 
she must lead her class or follow it. She goes with it in 
whatever position gives her opportunity best to control it, 
to halt it, to turn it, or otherwise to direct it by spoken 
command. There is no running on stairs, in halls, or on 
the street. The usual style of marching to assembfies, 
workshops, or kitchens is observed in fire drills. The 
control of classes out of the classroom and outside of the 
building is similar to that observed in the recitation rooms. 

66. A remarkable exhibition of planning, organization, 
and management by ]5rooklyn principals and teachers was 
observed on Saturday and Monday, the twenty-ninth and 
thirty-first of May, when 4500 school children sang at the 
Thirteenth Regiment Armory as part of the National 
Saengerfest given by the United Singers of Brooklyn. 

[41] 




AT THE SAENGBRFEST 



It will be recalled that on an occasion like this in 
Manhattan, three years ago, a committee of selected men 
had to be sent as an emergency measure to the Madison 
Square Garden to bring order out of chaos. Principal 
Floyd R. Smith, of Public School 167, Brooklyn, was 
selected by District Superintendent Benjamin Veit to 
deliver, police, and dismiss the 4500 young Brooklynites 
at this May festival. Mr. Smith was assisted by eleven 
principals selected by him, and by forty-five teachers 
selected by them. The assembling, seating, and dismissal 
were done with such precision and despatch that Mr. 
David Koos, the Fest President, declares it was far and 
away the best management he ever saw at any saengerfest. 
67. It is not impossible that other school ofBcials may 
be called upon at some future time to furnish a large 
chorus of school children. Thinking that it would be a 
convenience to be abl^ to refer to memoranda of all the 
details considered necessary to carry off the affair with 
eclat, I asked Mr. Smith to let me have for this report a 
working plan. Here is his: 

Plan for Management of Children at a Mass Concert 

(a) Appoint one chairman to take charge. 

(b) He selects assistants for special stations. 

[42] 



(c) These hold a meeting and go over plans and select 

teachers at rate of one for each hundred children. 
Ten per cent, additional to cover absences of 
teachers. 

(d) Superintendent writes these asking them to serve; 

outlines their duties and asks them to communi- 
cate with chairman. 

(e) Chairman gets fifteen blue-prints of the platform 

and scats. 

(/) Chairman gets from music director summary of par- 
ticipants showing number of each kind of voice 
from each school. 

ig) Chairman and music director mark on a blue-print 
the seats to be occupied by sopranos, boys, girls, 
etc. Chairman gets director's signature on the 
plan and his guarantee not to ask for changes in 
position. 

(h) In the last two saengerfests the architect or builder 
has at first sui)plied seats amounting to 500 to 
1000 less than the number required to seat the 
number of children asked for. The minimum sit- 
ting space for a young Brooklyn singer, averaging 
stout and thin, high school and elementary school 
vocalists, is ly'ff feet wide. 

(i) Request the City Superintendent to write to the 
manager of the saengerfest that so many more 
scats must be provided or it will be necessary to 
abandon the concert. The number of children 
asked for have been drilled and expect to par- 
ticipate. There is no basis for dismissing some. 
The saengerfesters will have to take the odium, 
not the school jjcople. 

(j) Architect finds out how he can supply more seats. 
Learns that schools mean business and keeping of 
promises (moral lesson). 

[43] 



(k) Get authoritative statement as to who is respon- 
sible for necessary labor in the armory, opening 
certain doors, moving chairs, etc. 

{1} Select avenues of access to different seats in the ar- 
mory. Plan dismissals for close of rehearsal same 
as for close of concert, same in case of fire or panic. 

(to) Assign school men at all platform stairs as accelera- 
tors when proceeding to seats for rehearsal and 
concert. 

(n) Assign men at top of platform stairs to guide lines 
to designated seats quickly. 

(o) Select schools nearest the armory as mustering 
centers each for different kinds of singers thus: 
1 center: first soprano, boys, elementary 
1 center: second soprano, boys 
1 center: first soprano, girls 
1 center: second soprano, girls 
1 center: contralto, boys 
1 center: contralto, girls 
1 center: all high school boys 
1 center: all high school girls 

{p) Designate a manager for each center and one teacher 
for every 100 children. 

(q) Instruct managers as to reception of children in 
centers, grouping them into sections according to 
the blue-print of the platform, emphasizing the 
section numbers for the members of each section, 
forming columns two by two. Route of march 
from each center to the armory. Which entrance 
at armory to use. Necessity of a space in march- 
ing between one section and any section marching 
behind it. 

(r) Obtain from Committee on Care of Buildings direc- 
tions to the janitors of the buildings selected to 
open rooms at times designated. 
[44] 



(s) Notify as to centers and time of muster, principals 
of all schools contributing singers. Tell them the 
superintendent desires the principals to have 
participants assembled in their schools and im- 
pressed with necessity for attention to directions, 
keeping in place, and exhibiting behavior worthy 
of their schools. Ask girls to wear white, boys 
to wear white waists if possible. Umbrellas if it 
looks like rain. Ask for reply from principals. 
Check up. Send second notice. 

(t) Chairman have at armory a stentor with a carry- 
ing voice and largest size megajihone. He is to 
remain near conductor's platform, rehearsals and 
concerts, from start to finish. 

(w) At first rehearsal instruct children through stentor 
tliat a bugle call means "Silence, Usten to announce- 
ment." Arrange with cornetist for this service. 

(r) Instruct the men mentioned in paragraphs n and o 
where the emergency headquarters are, so that 
anyone fainting or needing assistance may be 
taken quickly to the temporary hospital. 

(it') Arrange with saengerfest authorities for distribution 
of flags as lines enter armory, for distribution of 
dimes (carfare to and from each rehearsal) at head 
of platform stairs. No payment to be made until 
just before the concert. 

(x) Dismissal, line by line, under conduct of teachers as 
designated by stentor. Break ranks on reaching 
street. 

(y) Notify sui)erintendent of especially excellent service. 
Ask him to thank all teacher and pupil partici- 
pants. Also letters to the persons who helped the 
most. 
68. The most essential feature of the teachers' and 

principals' management at the Brooklyn Saengerfest 

C45] 




FLAG DAT 



was the preservation of the two-by-two formation. No 
one was allowed to get out of line. 

69. On June 14, 1915, Mr. William A. Campbell, of 
Brooklyn, assembled, and Mr. George Gartlan, of Brook- 
lyn, directed, 11,360 school children in the Music Grove 
in Prospect Park, where they celebrated the adoption of 
the national flag. They saluted it, sang patriotic songs, 
and marched away, as they had come, cheerfully, steadily, 
and prettily, a walking example of good management by 
their principals and teachers. Throughout both divisions, 
schools left their buildings for a few moments and marched 
with waving flags to some near-by open space, where they 
saluted and sang. This is an exercise in management 
which should be simply and briefly done each annual flag 
day. Let the people see that the symbol of patriotism 
means something to the schools. 



PRINCIPAL S INCREASED RESPONSIBILITY 

70. To take general rules for efficiency supervision as 
developed in modern management and to apply them to 
the Brooklyn divisions will require, it seems to me, wide 
recognition that the separate working unit — schools — 

[46] 




IN A SYSTEM OF THIS SIZE, THE PrPIL IS LOST SIGHT OF 



be given more importance, and that their managers — 
principals — be given more positive encouragement to 
work out iiiijjrovements in their own way. Greater 
decentraHzation, with more voluntary suggestion, more 
open conferences, is the rule in organizations of all kinds 
as compared with the custom of ten years ago. For this 
reason I have emphasized the preliminary participation 
of principals in the establishment of efficiency standards 
and in the fornmlation of efficiency records. I regard as 
of great importance that part of the principal's record 
which provides for "general remarks, facts showing prin- 
cipal's own introduction of special features." 

71. I get a belief from their expressions that the Brook- 
lyn principals, as a rule, feel less freedom than they did 

[47] 



fifteen years ago. This may be due to the power 
suggestion arising from some widely published statemen. 
of Dr. Paul H. Hanus in 1911-13. It may be a conse 
quenee of the greater size of the city's organization. 
"In a system of this size" is a phrase that has been 
worked too much with the purpose to secure uniformity. 
A larger system, because it has more principals, ought to 
have a greater number distinguished by original ideas. 
There is too much cynical doubt in Brooklyn about 
encouragement given to individual divergence. 



principals: obedience and originality 

72. I notice among some of the later appointees a 
debilitative tendency to extreme subordination different 
from the old Brooklyn style. These men need the en- 
couragement of a supervisor to lean less and to stand on 
their own feet more. They listen respectfully, venture 
no objections, and utter no heresies. This, if extended, 
would produce a military type for schools as if on Alex- 
ander Hamilton's model of an army where all the think- 
ing is done at headquarters. In a school system, a 
supervisor ought to learn more from the sum of all the men 
on the job than they from him. Suggestions, like most 
live things, ought to move chiefly upwards. 

73. To a supervisor, originality, which is another word 
for divergence, when evident in the supervised, seems 
like disobedience. It is not so easy to control. It is an 
enemy of discipline. But the worst fault I have observed 
in any Brooklyn school is the sterilizing dominion of 
precedent and tradition, a static tendency seeming to be 
founded on fear of disobeying some authority. The 
life of a school under a man so dominated is merely gal- 
vanic, awaiting an outside stimulus and relapsing into 
formalism when that is removed. In such a school, 

[48] 



'pmment on poor results brings one of two answers, "I 
;id exactly as ordered" or "I was never told to do any 
-differently." In contrast to this are those schools in 
which the principal keeps ideals prominent rather than 
form, and wins attention to best methods by testing and 
comparing results. I saw in one school a set of pocket 
cards on which the principal records his observations in 
the classroom. These two prominent headings printed 
upon the record seemed to me real business: "Teacher's 
aim, expressed or evident " "Results, " 

WHERE A PRINCIPAL OUGHT TO BE 

74. It is my observation that many principals have a 
singularly sane and high conception of their duties and 
make a strong effort to plan their days in accordance 
with a true perspective of the relative importance of highly 
effective and of supplementary acts. For instance, out 
of 63 visits to schools, after I began recording this detail, 
I found 48 principals, or 76 %, in classrooms observing 
and not sitting in offices. Their conception of their 
duties seems to be that of a foreman in the works. The 
old tradition which sent a man walking through the 
rooms once a day is not evident. One principal tells his 
assistants that less than fifteen minutes' observation is 
not worth counting. One tells me that the habit of 
much teaching by the principal was a mistake and is a 
waste in a large school. Unless a principal specifically 
directs a teacher to observe a principal's lesson as a model 
and quizzes her upon its essential points, he had much 
better keep quiet. But better than all, he says, is the 
oral or written testing of what the teacher says she has 
trained the class to do. 

75. It seems to me that what official pressure is brought 
to bear upon a principal ought to push him into the class- 

[49] 



rooms, but the principals tell me that they feel the strong- 
est official pull toward the office. Neglect of examination 
and inspection is not immediately apparent and is rarely 
reprimanded; but lack of promptness in office work 
cannot be concealed. The dislike of reprimand has 
produced more attention to the supplementary services 
of a principal than is consistent with the adequate per- 
formance of his more valuable duties. I have not found 
any principal who believes the clerical requirements upon 
the schools moderate or satisfactory or necessary. 

REDUCTION OF CLERICAL WORK 

76. In 1914 the report of the president of the Board of 
Education contains opinions of ninety-eight per cent, of 
the principals that excessive statistics, reports, computa- 
tion, and writing prevent the principals from apportioning 
their time in fair proportion for essentials. 

77. A Brooklyn woman principal puts the situation 
thus: "Oftentimes I go to my school enthusiastic for 
service with teachers for the children. A traditional 
sense of propriety leads me to open my mail first. On 
reading it I know that I am worth more to the city in the 
classroom than in answering this. But the authorities 
invest the demand for an answer with the urgency of a 
crisis. By the time I have attended to this requirement, 
what freshness I had is gone. I give my children second- 
rate devotion; my best has gone to system." It is an 
almost universal custom of business men to attend to 
the morning mail the first thing. The Brooklyn princi- 
pals have absorbed this business habit. The supervision 
over them encourages it. Preceding his appearance 
before a congregation which he hopes to move to higher 
things, a minister would not dull the edge of his enthusiasm 
upon commercial matters. A principal's morning fresh- 

[50] 



ness ought to go into the inspiration of his staff to high 
grade work, into observation and supervision, not into 
office detail. The abuse that has come about by the 
tyranny of business custom could be mitigated by a 
counter-despotism in the form of a prohibition of office 
work by principals before noon, an order that principals 
are not to be called to telephones in the morning, a proc- 
lamation that the schoolmaster's ante meridiem assign- 
ment is where the educative processes are at work. 

78. Following such advice should come a thorough 
examination of the complaints of too much clerical work 
and a resultant report of definite plans for reform. Either 
the amount of the requirements or their administration 
is a very wasteful hindrance to the main purpose of the 
schools in the Brooklyn divisions. 

79. Too many reports compiled from data furnished 
by principals reach them too long after the opening of 
the term to be of maximum value. Too many reports 
made by principals are never known by the makers to 
have been made use of. It would reduce the drudgery 
of reporting if every request for data were accompanied 
by a promise to furnish the giver with summary and 
conclusions made from such data. This report is so largely 
a compilation of material received from Brooklyn teachers 
and princii)als that I respectfully request a copy of it sent 
to each Brooklyn school before the opening day in Sep- 
tember. 

80. Some Brooklyn principals whose schools have 
grown to proportions undreamed of when the duties of a 
schoolmaster began to be formulated in by-laws and in 
books upon school management have changed their 
habits as circumstances altered. They do not personally 
perform the functions listed in the department manual. 
They are occasionally recipients of some official message, 
spokeu, telephoned, or written, expecting them to have 

[51] 



immediate personal knowledge of one or some supple- 
mentary facts. Such knowledge would be unexpected in 
the case of a manager of a business concern of a quarter 
the size of the school. His assistants would have it; 
records of it would be accessible. Brooklyn principals 
who have delegated such things and who devote them- 
selves to the direct management and inspiration of effec- 
tive work by teachers are the ones whose schools give the 
largest return for the cost. 

81. I recommend that you request the Division of Ref- 
erence and Research to obtain from the principals of the 
best managed schools outlines for the provision of classi- 
fied duties and to publish a monograph, to be called 
The Management of a Large New York School, for the 
increase of the efficiency of all principals of the large 
organizations. 

CHEERING THE PRINCIPAL 

82. The principal's position here is not so attractive 
as it was in 1898. The $3500 salary now is worth only 
about $2000 in purchasing power as compared with its 
value seventeen years ago. To keep him in prime work- 
ing condition until a distraught fiscal situation is able to 
repair his money loss, his official counsellors need to give 
him more than the ordinary confidence, respect, and 
appreciation. The late State Commissioner Draper, in 
an address to principals, insisted that progressive educa- 
tional administration meant greater rela.xing of rules. 
The present State Commissioner Finley, speaking on 
school administration, called for less of the attitude of 
the hired man, more of the spirit of the volunteer. In a 
large system it is easy to bind all to prevent repetition of 
a foolish act by one. But the larger the system the 
greater the number of men irritated and belittled by 
such ill-considered restriction. For the Brooklyn divi- 

[ 52 ] 



sions, as long as their administration and supervision is 
assigned to me, I would advocate the widest possible use 
of principals' councils for general good and, by principals, 
the widest use of free and voluntary teachers' councils 
for benefit of the children. 

EFFICIENCY RECORDS OF GRADUATES 

83. Records of efficiency of others than principals 
need attention in the Brooklyn divisions. 

84. The "Estimate of pupils' attainments" now made 
for graduates is not, as far as I can observe in Brooklyn, 
worth the labor required. These cards are taken by 
graduates to high schools, but there such paltry use is 
made of them that the work of filling them out might 
well be spared the elementary schools. This is the 
estimate put upon them in the high schools: "More 
trouble than they are worth." " Not looked at." " Could 
get along very well without them." "Only use we make 
is, when a parent claims that failure here is our fault, to 
look up grammar school record and show that boy was 
weak before he came." "We never see them." "Have 
heard of a Manhattan principal using them, but we 
could never find time." 

85. As they are not used by the schools in which the 
graduates deposit these records, the value of an efficiency 
report for children not going to higher schools should be 
considered. I obtained from several employers their 
fists of abilities they want to know about in the case of 
young applicants. It differs materially from the attain- 
ment record now furnished to graduates. 

86. The following record, to be printed on a convenient 
sized card, contains all the facts on the present graduation 
certificate which the high school princii)als say are used, 
and it contains also a summary of what employers say 
they would like to know: 

[53] 



Certificate for Employers or Schoolmasters 

Henry Smith, residing at 165 Decatur Street, Borough of Brooklyn, 
born June 5, 1902, parent, John Smith, satisfactorily completed an 
eight-year course in Public School 500, Brooklyn, on June 30, 1915. 

He has attended school days since his thirteenth birthday. 

(For pupil under 14 years.) 



He attended school days during the past 12 months. 

pupil over 14 years of age.) 



(For 





CHECK IN PROPER COLUMN 


HIS HAPIT RECORD IS: 


Excellent: 

much 

above 

average 


Very good: 
above 
average 


Good: 
average 


Poor: 

below- 
average 


Legible handwriting 










Neat work 










Arithmetic — accuracy and 
reasonable speed 










Business forms 










Ability to compose a gram- 




















Reliability 








































Punctuality 




















Hand work with tools, use of 
simple machinery 





















Employers are earnestly requested to keep this record on file and to 
advise the principal ot any pronounced divergence from it observed 
during employment. 

, Principal, 

Public School 

Brooklyn, N. Y. 

87. It would be worth while advertising to employers 
that we are cooperating with them in getting abilities 
that can be depended on. It would be of advantage to 

[54] 



the graduates to have a definite recommendation. It 
would be of value to the children still in school to know 
that employment depends upon record. I believe the 
majority of employers are so desirous of getting efficient 
boys and girls that they would respond to an invitation 
to favor applicants bringing efficiency records. It would 
assist to put an end to charges of inefficiency against 
schools by employers who judge training by immature 
workers who have failed in school and left it. 

88. I would recommend that these items, after amend- 
ment by a principals' conference, be incorporated in all 
new record cards which pass from teacher to teacher as 
a child is promoted and that they be so printed that 
valuation marks of these habits may be checked in rating 
columns for the sixth, seventh, and eighth years. 

EFFICIENCY RECORDS OF TEACHERS 

89. The attention given in all kinds of management 
to "reliable, immediate, adequate, and permanent records 
of personal efficiency" has come into consideration of 
educational supervisors to an increasing extent in the 
last few years. A society for the promotion of school 
measurements is growing in numbers. The professional 
press gives extended .space to articles upon the new 
demand. There has been more attention to teachers' 
ratings in the proceedings of local associations this year 
than during any equal period. A Brooklyn principal. 
Dr. Isadore Springer, compiled this year, and the Educa- 
tion Department's Division of Reference and Research 
printed it, a seventy-five page manual of tests and stand- 
ards for measuring the efficiency of instruction and 
management. It shows that "the year 1914 has seen a 
remarkable growth in the promulgation of standards by 
which a school may be judged and in a widespread ten- 
dency to test schools by standards." 

[55] 



90. I recommend that the Division Superintendent 
assigned to Brooklyn next year take up in voluntary 
conferences with principals and teachers the "provisional 
plans for the measure of merit of teachers" given in this 
handbook and decide upon a trial of a revised scheme of 
appraising the work of teachers. 

91. The main trouble with rating teachers in Brooklyn 
is the lack of efficiency standards. A teacher's record in 

successive schools to 
which she is transfer- 
red rises and falls like 
the waves of the sea. 
Two persons rating 
the same teacher 
at the same time 
vary from "A" to 
"C" in their records. 
The lack of standards 
in terms of success 
leaves the rating sur- 
charged with subjec- 
tive influences. The 
appraisal is temperamental on the judge's part and 
not supported by evidence. The defence of a rating in 
specific cases fails to convince any one because the recorder 
has no supporting data. A principal who has rated a 
teacher nonmeritorious feels, in case of an appeal, that 
he is to be put on trial as if for misdemeanor. It is so 
much easier to rate a teacher "A" (superior) than to 
give any other record that our rating system from lack of 
enforcement becomes an approval of the commonplace. 
If a principal correctly rates a teacher "inferior" and 
thereby saves the city eighty dollars, the chances are that 
he will be put to sufficient trouble and annoyance to drive 
him into the ranks of those who "never mark a teacher 
[56] 




TIME IS NOT MERIT 



down." There is no specific protester against over-rating 
a teacher, no watch-dog of the treasury to prevent pay- 
ment as if for meritorious service to an inefEcient benefi- 
ciary. The Brooklyn principals need strong backing to 
encourage them to use the rating system for the purpose 
which led to its introduction. It ranks as a promise 
unfulfilled. The reforms proposed by teachers, princi- 
pals, and superintendents this year emphasize "frequent 
and thorough inspection by some one acquainted with 
the problems of the school and class; first-hand knowl- 
edge of the work; material reasons accompanied by 
evidence." These essentials are procurable to a large 
degree by issue of directions to principals and by help in 
the way of suggestions as to how to get data for ratings. 
The official provisions for these ratings emphasize that 
the record is of the service. A principal does not properly 
mark a teacher, but should rate a teacher's work. 

92. The whole body of recent literature upon this 
subject recognizes the need of getting away from the 
super-subjective element, from the personal flavor, to a 
business-like recognition that a fine disposition may be 
accompanied by inefficient service. The sentimental and 
strained attitude of a young writer toward a manuscript 
submitted to an editor is similar to the feeling that has 
been fostered in teachers toward their record. An author 
may be deserving, he may be in need of money, he may 
have worn himself to sinew writing his story, but the 
editor accepts it upon no other ground than its merit. 
No successful painting master spares the truth in criticising 
pictures submitted to him. The amateurish sentimental- 
ity that leads principals to find excuse for wasting public 
money by marking up deficient service does the best and 
poorest teachers inestimable harm and is a species of graft. 

93. I recommend a redefinition of meritorious service, 
and a new analysis of details on which an appraisal of 

[57] 




4,000. 

7,01111. 
OSOO 
(jDflfl 
SJM 

SOW' 

^■foO' 

•1.000 

iioo- 

Joon- 

i.'.oo 

1.5flO- 

9(I0- 
son. 
70 n. 




SALARIES AUTOMATICALLY INCREASED 

teachers' work is to be based. There is, I think, too much 
dweUing upon manner of work, preparation for work, 
too much upon the teacher as a person, and not enough 
upon what the children she trains can do. I propose, if 
assigned to any division next year, to secure by voluntary 
conferences an outline for rating teachers which shall 
involve greater consideration of the advancement of a 
teacher's class in acquisition of habits and abilities ap- 
praised by actual tests. 



EFFICIENCY REWARDS 

94. The question of school wages has been acute this 
year. The Mayor and Comptroller have deemed com- 
pensation too high and have reprehended the lack of rela- 
tion between increase of salary and any demonstrated 
increase of value returned. On the other hand, an 
organization of teachers has published in the Brooklyn 
newspapers a scheme for abolishing all systems established 
for the purpose of recognizing a relation between higher 

[58] 





^ 


% 




1^ 


g J j 


® 


^ 




^ AnXftAFkHY" 



A WAGE IS A GAUGE IN INDUSTRY 



pay and better service. The association promulgates 
the dictum: "Salaries for teachers must and can be only 
automatically increased." This proposition has been 
made so often that I deem it worthy of a reference here. 
95. It was in Brooklyn, through the labors of Mrs. E. 
F. Pettingil! and other members of the Board of Edu- 
cation, including the City Superintendent, that the fun- 
damentals of the present New York salary law were 
estabiislied, to wit: a living wage as the basis of all sala- 
ries to which increments were to be added for the more import- 
ant and more meritorious services. The idea of automatic 
increases is abhorrent to accepted principles of organiza- 
tion and of payment. A wage is a gauge. From the time 
when Adam Smith defined wages as the encouragement 
of industry, political economists as well as unlettered 
employers have understood that more pay should mean 
better service. In a little town where every teacher's 

[59] 



are the 
"Where 



service can be known personally by those who determine 
the rates of pay, each salary is fixed by discussion and 
debate. Efficiency records, written appraisals, ratings, 
result of increased numbers of paid workers, 
there are many hands," saith the ancient 
Preacher, "put all in 
writing, in number, and 
in weight." There has 
been presented to the 
Board of Superinten- 
dents the argument that 
"rating of teachers is un- 
professional. No mem- 
bers of other professions 
are rated by symbols 
of any kind given by a 
higher officer, placed 
on paper or kept on 
record." But whenever 
professional men work 
in considerable numbers, 
as in an organized hos- 
pital, in a large sani- 
tary service, in an ex- 
tended engineering contract, ratings are made ivith a 
minuteness and exactness that make ours by comparison 
look like child's play. 

96. No essential of productive management is em- 
phasized more strongly than connection between efliciency 
records and monetary rewards. Prior to 1897 the schools 
of these Brooklyn divisions were covered by eflSciency 
records as to their principals and teachers, but there were 
no salary rewards for increased efficiency except as a 
person secured promotion to another grade. Salary 
rewards for greater service were therefore possible only 
[60] 




WHY SHOULD NOT A WAGE BE A 
GAUGE IN TEACHING TOO? 



when a vacancy in a higher grade occurred. There was 
no customary reliance upon a teacher's efficiency record 
in determining her promotion to the higher salary. "The 
more meritorious teachers were often distanced by the self- 
seeking and the powerful," as said the City Superinten- 
dent in his Annual Report, July 31, 1900. These Brook- 
lyn divisions, in common with the rest of the schools, 
came under the present law, which makes increase of 
salaries possible to teachers of all grades. The Governor, 
whose signature to 
this enactment was 
necessary to give 
it force, declared 
he would sign 
bill increasing 
pay of service 
mere length of 
perience. He 
sorted that 
measure 
tended to c n » u • t , 

.,v,..vAvv» SHOULD MORE FUEL PRODUCE MORE FIRE? 

the managers of 

the school system to encourage increase of efficiency 
by increase of pay. I do not find, in Brooklyn, that this 
usual adjustment of wages as a means of promoting 
service is enough used for producing better results in the 
schools. A teacher who reaches merely a satisfactory 
standard of service gets, under the rules of administration, 
an increased stipend each year up to the maximum allowed 
by law. That is not encouragement for increase in skill. 
The number who are rated unsatisfactory by Brooklyn 
principals is 15 out of 6'-209 teachers, a quarter of one 
per cent. The ordinary business man, comparing this 
infinitesimal proportion of failures with the failures in 
other pursuits, calls the school system's record of the 

[61] 




efficiency of its teachers a "fake." It is absurd that a 
superintendent assigned to a division is suppHed with no 
data competent to show whether the usage of rating 
teachers is a fake or not. This lack of connection between 
increased pay and increased value of results is so vulner- 
able a defect that the claim of unwise expenditure of 
money is easy to make against the department. It has 
been made this year by persons of high position in the 
municipality. It will be a point of attack so vulnerable 
that when a very severe financial crisis comes, the weak- 
ness of defence of our salary usage will result in drastic 
reductions and consequent damage to teaching. 

97. The organization of the divisions does not place in 
the hands of a division superintendent or of anyone in 
the system adequate proof that the children are being 
well taught or that increased wages are being paid to 
those whose pupils are being taught with increased suc- 
cess. A teacher whose work is barely satisfactory year 
after year is rated under our system as "B." If a teacher 
works 87 % of the expected 193 days each year with a 
service rated at "B," she is increased in salary under 
our rules. This is not in accord with any wage or salary 
principle with which I am familiar. Brooklyn news- 
papers have this year given much publicity to criticisms 
upon the administration of this salary plan and of the 
rating system which is an adjunct to it. In these publica- 
tions the claim has been made that it is a system for the 
promotion of mediocrity. 

98. There have been prominent claims made this year 
that the ratings of teachers are not based upon success 
achieved in training the children. The Association of 
Women Principals contends that the present rating of 
teachers "is too apt to be influenced by sentiment, im- 
pression, and personal feeling." They claim that the 
present ratings are based upon too limited a line of the 

[62] 




teacher's work and are not sufficiently considered in 
determining promotion to higher salary or in the granting 
of higher licenses. This association suggests explicit 
statement of defects in the case of service below satis- 
factory and details of excellences warranting a rating 
above satisfactory. It advocates for the effect upon 
service "specific terms rather than indefinite ill-defined 
marks." "Requirement of explicit 
grounds for an unsatisfactory mark 
will make it possible for the teacher, 
the principal, and the superintend- 
ent to have on record the definite 
deficiencies so as more intelligently 
to remove them." The absence of 
explicit statements of points of 

J- .. .• • • 1 RATING 18 INFLUENCED 

distuiction m service above mere 

. ,, « ■ ^'^ SENTIMENT 

satisfactory prevents recogniz- 

ing and crediting individual excellence and is a source 
of grief and annoyance to every principal." "Such 
definiteness would provide the Board of Education with 
accurate knowledge of the quality and quantity of the 
work done in the schools, would provide the Board of 
Examiners with a sure gauge of the value to be given to 
teachers' experience, and should be the basis of advance- 
ment in salary." 

99. It will be observed that these suggestions of the 
Association of Women Principals are in accord with the 
rules laid down by the authors on management to whom 
I have referred. There is not a Brooklyn principal with 
whom I have conferred who does not desire the efficient 
use of the rating system as set forth in the resolutions 
just quoted. 

10(». I am ashamed to be considered as "administering 
and supervising" a division expending over fifteen million 
dollars a year for teaching the children under a system of 

[63] 



paying teachers that is deemed of little use by its own 
chief agents, the principals. It provides no adequate 
answer to the charge that the department is wasting 
money, and that its children cannot write or spell or 
figure. Those of us who visit the schools believe them 
first-rate. That is no answer to the criticisms that have 
been widely published this year. The superintendent of 
any body of paid workers organized to do any specific thing 
is universally expected to produce evidence that all the persons 
employed are delivering the product paid for. 

101. The Brooklyn division would be improved by 
official review of the rating system and by executive 
directions for very much stricter marking. 

102. Urgency for better administration of a rating 
system in Brooklyn schools is very great. The city 
agencies concerned with keeping down expenditures 
charge that "teachers are shirks," that "the children are 
not taught," and that "good, bad, and indifferent teach- 
ing is all rewarded" by increased pay. In January the 
newspapers declared that the record which had been 
issued, showing that 99 f % of the 6000 Brooklyn teachers 
were rated meritorious, needed only to be shown to any 
manager of organized workers to bring the comment, 
"Fake!" I have worked in systems which underwent 
the slashmg cuts m wages advocated, now, by men high 
in municipal affairs. I know what a chiUing and sullen 
atmosphere accompanies such a reduction. No eulogy 
upon the noble service of the teacher is answer to the 
specific charges of inefficient administration of the pay- 
rolls. This is a foolish time to advocate remission of a 
rating system. The call is rather for a stiff enforcement in 
order that the principle of increased rewards for increased 
value may be used effectively. Otherwise, if increases 
are not refused for mediocre service, all service, including 
the best, vnll suffer from withdrawal of efficiency rewards. 

[64] 



DISCIPLINE OF STAFF 




OHAL COMPLAINTS 



103. Many times this year there have occurred things 
which indicate the weakness of educational administra- 
tion as compared with organizations which are con- 
ducted on efficient principles. The office hours of super- 
intendents are to a considerable degree consumed by 
listening to oral complaints of individual teachers. Com- 
munications would be sim- 
pler, more distinct, and 
fairer if put in writing. 
A teacher given respect- 
ful and sympathetic atten- 
tion makes charges of 
injustice and unfairness 
against a principal. These 
are certain to create a 
prejudice against him 
which subsequent investigation, though disclosing that 
there was no unfairness in his action, will fail to re- 
move. The feeling among the Brooklyn principals 
that "Fifty-ninth Street" is not scrupulous in sup- 
plying persons complained of with a statement of the 
coinplaint.s, is too general. There is a cynical idea in 
Brooklyn that the discipline common to other organ- 
izations is lacking in ours. Where so many workers 
are women and thus entitled by tradition to more 
deferential attention, it is not hard for a system to de- 
velop a good deal of personal criticism of principals by 
teachers. When women's wages were low and teaching 
was a half-charity, the hardship of the position led to more 
sj'inpathy and consideration than would be expected by 
better paid persons. The wages of the women are now 
the same, jiretty much, as those of the men. The number 
of persons who would like to have these positions is large. 

[65] 



aULES. 
DONT BAHq-ER 
THE BiCtBOSS 



In the usual type of organization other than ours, every 
member knows instinctively that it is good business to 
get along with his foreman without quarrels and without 
complaint. No efficient concern will have as much 
running to the man higher up as is encouraged by our 
traditions. You can't stop aggrieved persons appealing 
from requirements made of them and ought not to stop 
it, but the confidential recital of alleged wrongs which 
used to be so common a characteristic of the old political 

system could be di- 
minished very con- 
siderably if there 
were a gentlemen's 
agreement that all 
the parties con- 
cernedwould be 
given participation 
in all the interviews 
and there would be 
no interview other- 
wise. This is a stiff 
proposition for a 
school system, but it is what the writers on organization 
and management of all sorts of systems are demanding. 
"The fair deal," "the abolition of the star chamber," 
"playing the game above the table," "fifty-fifty," — 
these are phrases indicating this trend and found in the 
current works on supervision. Loyalty is too essential 
to be lightly destroyed by a hope of righting personal 
wrongs. Allegiance upwards and dowTiwards is weaker 
in the school system than it needs to be. 

104. If I am assigned to a division next year, I should 

like an understanding that complaints regarding principals 

or teachers are not to be made informally and offhand, but 

as formal appeals which will be transmitted for reply to the 

[66] 



L 




IT S GOOD BUSINESS TO GET ALONG WITH 
THE rOHEM,\N 




DON T BOTHER ME WITH SUCH GHOSS CONSIDERATIONS 

person concerned. If this is magnifying little hurts into 
momentous questions for arbitration, it is also conducive 
to endurance of some little hurts as good exercise of the 
patience that belongs to the day's work. 

105. I should like to publish that, as far as my super- 
vision of a division is concerned, anonymous letters, 
whether complaining of teachers or of principals, have 
been discarded from modern school management and go 
unread. 



COSTS 

106. To every writer upon business management, it is 
astonishing how little the head of a school knows about 
the cost of it and about the cost distribution. It is the 
characteristic of educational systems to keep the purely 
educational staff in ignorance of financial facts. The 
schoolmaster is not a participant in financial policies 
because he is unpractical. He is made more unpractical 
by keeping him out of financial policies. Whole volumes 
of "efficiency" literature are devoted to keeping track 
of costs, reducing waste, and making a dollar produce a 
maximum result. The long disinclination of educators 
to consider cost obligations has made them the victims 

[67] 



of much contempt felt by "practical" men. When such 
men have control of the allotment of taxes to school 
activities, the schoolmaster who has no sense of costs 
and equivalent services stands low. I recommend for 
■practical problems in arithmetic a principal" s computation 
of how much money, including salaries, heat, light, supplies, 
up-keep, and interest upon investment, is being expended per 
year binder his personal direction for the training of children. 
I saw one principal's computation that his school was 
costing the city $1364 a day, $'273 an hour, $4.55 a minute. 
Palavering in the assembly of that school, getting ready 
to get ready to get ready, was throwing away much good 
money. There is, in the aggregate, an enormous money 
waste in the course of the year, due to lack of realization 
that every minute of school time is paid for and should 
not be drivelled away on ill-considered use of tune, on 
unprepared haphazard performances. In some Brooklyn 
schools the teachers are training children to habits of 
application as early as ten o'clock on the first day of the 
term as if it were a Wednesday of the middle of the year. 
In some schools there is purposeful instruction given as 
late as three o'clock of the last day of June. I recom- 
mend that the principals who operate their plant full 
time on an efficiency basis be singled out for special 
reward as defenders of the schools against the ever- 
growing charges of loose and wasteful administration. 

PRONOUNCING THE SCHOOL SYSTEM ALL, WRONG 

107. Teachers have come with a statement that their 
principals regard them as utter failures. On investiga- 
tion it has been found that the principal had insisted, as 
he should have done, on better penmanship or on pupils' 
doing their sums twice before handing in the answers. 
Mention of a specific fault has been translated into com- 

[68] 



plete condemnation. A man who says that the graduates 
coming to his store can't spell, write, or figure is accused 
of saying the schools are a complete failure. This is 
nonsense. A similar treatment of this report, which 
recites some needs of Brooklyn schools as known to me, 
would result in the absurd statement that I, because I do 
not say it is all right, say the school system is all wrong. 
There is an easy and lazy fashion of school supervision 
which holds that many schools being good, surely some 
poor ones may be tolerated. There are in some Brooklyn 
school principals traces of a fear, dating from the days of 
pull and ])olitics, that anyone using in school supervision 
the methods of efficiency successful in other management 
will get himself disliked. Such a notion might be natural 
in the holder of an elective office, but a principal has such 
a grip on his position that he can really compel his school 
to make good and still hold his place. There is a push 
for better work in .schools. It is nation-wide. There is 
nothing to be gained by calling it "attack." It does not 
demand more exhausting work. It demands a different 
kind. I think Ihe new .service reciuired is more interesting, 
more enjoyable, than the traditional sort, which has 
failed to make school the alluring place for teachers and 
children that an educational ])lant ought to be. The 
drudgery of teaching will have to go before the calling 
reaches the .status of a "profession," about which we 
hear .so much. 

108. IMy propositions are intended to make the busi- 
ness more definite, results more demonstrable, separation 
of cheap work from artistry more easy, and the general 
tone of the employment more respectable. 

109. I know of so many persons in the Brooklyn part 
of the system who profess the same hopes, that I should 
Uke the freedom and the facilities for working out the 
plans here proposed. These plans involve no cessation of 

[69] 




praise and encouragement. They mean reward based on. 
evidence. They mean a recognition of the rights of the 
community as of more importance than our own. 



SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS 
110. 

I VERY school system I know of accumulates 
a collection of reports in which definite prop- 
ositions go no farther than to become aca- 
demic literature. This is due in part to the 
judgment of recipients of the reports that the 
propositions are unworkable or inopportune or of less 
importance than other pressing demands. But in con- 
siderable measure the neglect of recommendations is due 
to the fact that the reporter suggests work to be done 
by someone else. In the present case, the propositions 
are suggestions of what I will try to do if assigned to 
the Brooklyn divisions and given responsibility and 
authority to carry out the prospectus. 

111. I submit a summary of these propositions: 
(a) Provide by cooperation with the teachers them- 
selves for definition and renewal of modern educa- 
tional ideals by a professional bulletin issued to 
all teachers free, and by Saturday meetings to 
supplant the superintendent's Saturday morning 
office hour. 
(6) Rely more on councils of principals and teachers. 
(c) Invite a committee of employers to submit definite 
statements of what they expect of a public school 
graduate. Submit this to principals, citizens, and 
local boards. Formulate a list of such habits 
and abilities as are chiefly and secondarily the 
purpose of school. 
[70] 



(d) Make a tentative set of standards for estimating 

the prevalence of such habits and abilities. 

(e) Discuss and apply suggestions furnished by the 

New York Board of Education's Division of 
Reference and Research. 
(/) Induce some principals of large schools to try the 
plan of providing for an eighth year schedule 
which proui)s jjupils for special treatment in 
spelling, writing, and mathematical results, ac- 
cording to their tested ability. 
ig) Introduce^ jiructice in mathematical computation 
and in si)elling as entertaining features of assembly 
exercises. 
(/() Encourage a series of meets for contests between 
classes and schools in spelling, writing, and 
figuring. 
(i) Sup])lant the slightly valued efficiency record given 
to graduates by one that rates abilities about 
which employers desire information. Print upon 
new permanent record cards which accompany 
l)upils from grade to grade, provision for rating 
these abiUties in sixth, seventh, and eighth years. 
(j) Revise the system of rating teachers. Consider 
with voluntary councils the rating plans published 
by the Division of Research. Make increase of 
success, as demonstrable in work done, a condi- 
tion of increase of pay. 
(k) Agree that informal complaints shall not be received 
from members of the system. All parties com- 
plained of either will be present or will receive 
the complaints in writing. 
(l) Encourage pupils' patrols for keeping buildings clean, 
(m) Institute an examination of the amount of clerical 
work required of the schools and take steps to 
reduce it. 

[71] 



(n) Advise principals that office work by them before 
noon should be abandoned in favor of class inspec- 
tion and examination. 

(o) Prepare from observation of the best managed 
schools a monograph showing disposition of rou- 
tine and of higher functions. 

ip) Impress upon school managers the importance of 
a knowledge of daily and hourly cost of instruc- 
tion and the principal's function as an agent to 
guard against salary waste as well as misuse of 
other money expenditures. 

(q) Reward the principals who secure steady work of 
teachers and pupils on opening days and on days 
preceding vacations. 

(r) Detail two teachers for actual class tests through 
the schools as directed by the Division Super- 
intendent. 

(s) Make the short outdoor march on Flag Day an 
annual custom. 

(t) Let Brooklyn principals have this report early in 
September, 1915. 



[72] 



INDEX 

(Numbers refer to parayraphx) 



Abilities wanted by employers, 35, 

52, 111(c) 
Accurucy, 17 
Adamson, Robert, 65 
Adding twice, 17 
Addition tost, 11-7 
Ahearn Liiw, 96 
Aim of class work evident, 73 
Anonymous communications, 105 
Appeals, 104 

Arithmetic contests, 30, lll(/() 
Arithmetic, pleasure in, 26 
Arithmetic practice, 29, lll(ff) 
Arithmetic strain, 30 
Associations, professional, 46 
Attainments, pupils, estimate of, 

84 

Board of Estimate Inquiry, 71 
Urooklyn, growth of schools, 56 
Brooklyn Teachers' Association, 

46, 111(a) 
Buildings, condition of, 63, 111 
Bulletin, 50, 111(a) 
Business tests, 8-19 

Campbell, William A., 71 
Character building, definite, 37 
Cheering the principal, 82 
Chicago conferences, 47 
Chicago Official Magazine, 49 
Churchill, T. \V., 76 
Cleanliness of buildings, 63, 64 



Clerical work, 76-81, lll(m) 
Close of term, 106, lll(o) 
Complaints, treatment of, 103, 

lll(i-) 
Concert, 66-68 

Conferences, 47, 49, 82, 90, lll(a) 
Contests, arithmetic, etc., 30, 

111(« 
Cost of Brooklyn schools, 100 
Costs, knowledge of, 106, lll(p) 
Council, Principals', 47, 49, 82, 

111(6) 
Council, Teachers', 82, 92, 93, 

111(6) 
Courtis tests, 17 
Criticisms, 8, 9, 32, 94-105, 107, 

108 

Decentralization, 70 

Department-store tests, 8-20 

Discipline of staff, 103-105 

Dismissal, rapid, 65 

District Superintendents, 56 

Division report, what it should be, 
1 

Division of Reference and Re- 
search, 7, 51, 111(c) 

Draper, A. S., 82 

Drill, interested. 45 

Drudgery in schools, 44 

Eagle, Brooklyn Daily, 65 
Eagle, spelling bee, 31 

[73] 



Economy, 55, 102, 108 

Eddy, W. H., arithmetic contest, 

30 
Educational measurements, 89 
Education, what is an? 37 
Efficiency records, general, 57, 63, 

71 
Efficiency records of graduates, 84, 

90, lll(i) 
Efficiency records of teachers, 91, 

107 
Efficiency standards, 52-56, 93 
Eighty-nine, School No., 7 
Elliot, on purpose of schools, 39 
Emerson, Harrington, 42, 57 
Employers, abilities wanted by, 

35, 36, 37, 52 
Employers, cooperation with, 87 
Employers, tests by, 10 
Employment, canvass on, 11 
Estimate, Board of, inquiry, 71 
Estimate of pupil's attainments, 

84 
Estimates and results, 24 
Ettinger, William L., 5, 6 
Examination of schools, 56, 1 1 1 (r) 
Examiner, influence of, 23 
Exhibitions, arithmetic, spelling, 

etc., 30, 31 

Finley, John H., 82 

Fire drills, 65 

Fit and meritorious, 93 

Five, School No., 29 

Flag Day, 71, lll(s) 

Forty-three, School No., 64 

Fractions, test in, 11 

Freedom, 70 

Friedsam, Michael, quoted, 8 

Gantt, 41 
Gartlan, Geo., 71 

[74] 



Gary system, 7 

Graduate, desired abilities of, 33- 

40 
Graduates criticised, 8 
Group teaching, arithmetic, etc., 

27, UK/) 
Guess and result, 24 

Handbook for teachers, 89, 90 

Hanus, Paul, 71 

High schools and elementary 

school records, 84 
HoUister, 55 

Ideals, 43 

Ideals vs. standards, 55 
Industrial training, 5, 6 
Inquiry, Board of Estimate, 71 
Inspection, 59, 63, 75, 93, lll(r) 
Investigation, Hanus, 71 

Janitors, supervision of, 63 
Jordan, on purpose of school, 38 

Kaufman, 42 

Kirk, on purpose of school, 37 

Knack, the, 26 

Large school, management of, 81, 

lll(o) 
Letter writing, 11 
Local School Boards, 35, 52, 111(c) 

Magazine, official, 49, 50 

Management, instances of effi- 
cient, 63-77 

Marks, teachers', 89-105 

Masses, management of, 63-71 

Maxwell, William H., on purpose of 
school, 38 

Measurements, school, 89 

Meetings of teachers, 47, 50, lll(o) 



Meets, arithmetic, etc., 30, 111(A) 
Meritorious service, 93 
Message test, 11 
Method, credit for, 18 
Metz, Herman A., 76 
Mitcliel, John P., 'Ji 
Model lesson, 74 
Mordorf, Oliver C, 65 

Newspapers, criticisms by, 8, 9, 

58, 94, 97 
Newton, Wallace, 70 
Nineteen, School No., 65 

Obedience of principals, 72, 73 

O'Donnell, .1. A., 64 

Office hour, a waste, 48, 50, 103, 

lll(n) 
Office, principals in the, 74, 75 
One hundred thirty-nine. School 

No., 65 
Opening of term, 106, IIK?) 
Originality of principals, 72, 73 

Pedagogy reviled, 45 
Penmanship test, 11 
Periodical, official, 49, 50 
Periotlicals, professional, 44 
Personal product of schools, 34, 

38 
Pettingill, Mrs. E. F., 95 
Plan, necessity of a, 40, 74 
Playgrounds, 14 
Pleasure in arithmetic, 26 
Prendergast, William A., 94 
Principal, an efficiency record of, 

60. 61 
Principal, loss in salary, 82 
Principals' conferences and coun- 
cils, 47, 50, 82, 111(6) 
Principals, delegating their duties, 
80 



Principal's increased responsibil- 
ity, 70 
Principals in their offices, 74, 75 
Principal's morning, 77 
Principal's obedience, 72, 73 
Principals, promotion of, 59 
Principal, what is he for? 37 
Principal, where he ought to be, 

74,75 
Professional advancement, 43-51 
Professional literature, 44, 45 
Professional Teachers' Association, 

94 
Promotion of principals and teach- 
ers, 79, 96 
Publication, ofiScial, 49, 50 
Pull and politics, 107 

RafTerty, John W., 65 

Rapid dismissal, 65 

Ratings, teachers', 89-105, 111 (j) 

Rating of teachers, number of 

meritorious marks, 102 
Reading by teachers, 45 
Recommendations, 111 
Records, efficiency, 57-62 
Records of pupils' efficiency, 83— 

88 
Records of teachers' efficiency, 

89-105 
Reference and Research, Division 

of, 7, 51, 81, 89, 90, 111(e) 
Report for a division, what it 

should be, 9 
Reports, waste in, 74, 81, lll(m) 
Responsibility of principal, 70 
Results, 56, 73, 93, 97, 100, 109 
Results, record of, 55 
Revision of ideals, 43-51 
Rooms, care of, 64 
Roosevelt, Theodore, 96 
Rules, relaxed, 82 

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Saengerfest, 66-68 

Salaries, 45 

Salaries and service, 94-105 

Salaries, reduction of, 102 

Salary, not adjusted to service, 96 

Salary, principals', depreciation 

of, 82 
Sales slip, 11 
Samplers, 63 

Sanitary squad, 64, 111(0 
Saturday educational meetings, 47 

50, 111(a) 
School Boards, Local, 35, 52, 111(f) 
School management, outline 

needed, 81 
School measurements, 89 
Schools, examination of, 56, lll(r) 
Schools, inspection of, 56 
School system all wrong, 107 
School, what it is for, 37 
Science of supervision, 42 
Self-correction, 17, 20 
Seventy-eight, School No., 65 
Shiels, Albert, 51 
Sixty per cent, civilization, 19 
Smith, Adam, 95 
Smith, Floyd R., 66-70 
Smith, on purpose of schools, 37 
Societies, educational, 47 
Somers, Arthur S., 76 
Speed, 17 

Spelling bee, Eagle, 31 
Spelling test, 1 1 
Springer, Isadorc, 89 
Standards, 52-56, 71, 89, 111(d) 
Standards vs. ideals, 55 
Strain, arithmetic, 30 



Strayer, 62 

Summary of recommendations, 

110, 111 
Superintendents, decrease of, 56 
Superintendents, district, 56 
Superintendent, Division, 2 
Supervision, science of, 41 

Teachers assigned to testing, 56, 

lll(r) 
Teachers' Association, Brooklyn , 

47, 111(a) 
Teachers' Asociations, 46 
Teachers' Bulletin, 50, 111(a) 
Teachers' Council, 82, 91, 92, 

111(6) 

Teachers' meetings, 47, 50, 111(a) 

Teachers, promotion of, 59 

Teachers, records of their effi- 
ciency, 89-105, lll(i) 

Teachers' Year Book, 89 

Telephones, evil of, 77 

Testing, 74, 75 

Testing results, 56 

Tests by employer, 8-25 

Thorndike, 55 

Variation in tests, 25 

Veit, Benjamin, 67 

Vlymen, William T., arithmetic 

drills, 29 
Vocational training, 5, 6 
Volunteer, spirit of, 82 

Waste, 106 

Wirt, William, 7 

Women principals on ratings, 98 



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